


As Above, So Below

by taggerbug (milkweed_leaf)



Category: Tales of Arcadia (Cartoons)
Genre: Alien Biology, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Dubious Ethics, Experimentation, Gen, Original Character(s), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Troll Jim Lake Jr.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:07:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 36,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25269580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/milkweed_leaf/pseuds/taggerbug
Summary: "Something made him pause, and he turned to look at the evening sky. The wind rustled through the trees and hummed in the space between houses, as if a single drawn-out note lingering in a distant wind chime; the dimming blues and purples that streaked the sky dripped from the clouds like water and smeared the horizon with blurry trails of color. The buzzing of insects died, birds falling quiet, the shadows seeming to grow longer the longer Krel looked. Something was very wrong."A long story set after the events of Trollhunters and 3Below, with a focus on morality, ethics, and speculative biology. I will be posting painted illustrations on my tumblr @taggerbug. Tags will be updated as necessary, but will only include the characters prominently featured.UPDATE: New chapters posted every 2 weeks on Tuesday. Subject to change.
Relationships: Aja Tarron & Krel Tarron, Jim Lake Jr. & Claire Nuñez, Toby Domzalski & Claire Nuñez
Comments: 49
Kudos: 70





	1. Long Live House Tarron

**Author's Note:**

> The timeline of the show did not work for me, so I am altering it a bit - only a few weeks have passed since the end of 3Below, and the characters are still in school. Eli never went to Akiridion-5. 
> 
> The watercolor illustration for this chapter can be found [here](https://taggerbug.tumblr.com/post/622032313721683968/long-live-house-tarron-click-for-better). 
> 
> Warning - this fic will include some dark themes and events! If you have a specific topic you'd like me to warn for, please leave a comment or message me on tumblr @taggerbug.
> 
> This is my first time seriously writing fic, so please leave comments if you'd like. Enjoy :)
> 
> Thank you to my incredible audience tester, misfit-toy-haven on Tumblr!

It was one of the most puzzling mysteries in Arcadia. Mere weeks after the general population of the remote Californian town became aware of the small number of alien refugees living among them, they had all disappeared - gone back to their home planet, they had explained, to take charge of their distant civilization as they were always meant to. They said nothing of the newly furrowed canyons splintering the edges of the valley, or the tiny meteorites that had shredded roofs and cars, or the single massive burst of light that had seemingly been the source of the destruction. When asked, they muttered something that sounded like a prayer. The only thing they would freely admit was that their planet needed them, desperately. Then they left.

Except for one.

The townspeople of Arcadia caught a glimpse of him, sometimes, generally having shed his human disguise in the evenings. A shimmering light like an apparition, hovering on the fringes of their vision, usually too surrounded by high school students to get a good look. Then one of the students would crack a joke, and the crowd would break into laughter, accompanied by a reverberating facsimile of the same - like a crackling radio, emitting waves of amusement, the blue glow rippling with delight. Sometimes, the crowd would shift, and the townspeople would crane their necks, trying to be subtle about it, and they would _just_ get a glimpse of unnaturally long limbs and too many appendages - and then the students would move again, as if shielding the light from the outside, and the glimpse would be over. 

But the mere presence of the alien wasn’t the real mystery. The real mystery was why he was still _here_. His family - his sister? - had left, along with her alien guards and alien pet, leaving him behind. 

Sometimes, someone would dare to approach one of the students who had apparently become good friends with the alien, hoping to glean some answers to the mystery. 

“Is the alien not royalty, like his sister?”

“He is,” would be the assured response, the scrawny boy adjusting his glasses with confidence. “Didn’t you notice the arc carved into his forehead? That marking denotes an heir to the throne.”

The townsperson would nod feebly, unable to confess that they had never seen him up close. Not in his true skin, anyway. “But then why,” they would ask more boldly, “did he not return to his own planet, like his sister? Not that we don’t like him here,” they would hastily add in reply to the student’s eyebrows shooting up with shock. 

The student would always go quiet, at that point.

“He wants to be here,” was the simple response. “Wouldn’t you?”

There was no answer to that.

-

“Bye, Eli!” Krel waved to his friend as Eli’s bike swerved to turn onto a different road. Krel just caught a glimpse of an answering smile and raised hand before Eli disappeared around the corner, and Krel twisted the handlebars of his bike, turning back to the road before him as he pedaled towards his home. The remains of the mothership, appearing to all the world as a dated house, still stood proudly at the end of a cul-de-sac, an empty shell of its former glory: a functional ship by any means, but deprived of the warm sentience it had once possessed. 

Krel sighed as he pulled into the driveway, discarding his bike in front of the garage. There were no cars that the bike would get in the way of, after all, he thought as he reached the door. The blank robots never left the house, as they had no need to participate in the economy of this planet - the mothership may have been grounded, but there was still plenty of energy left in its fusion engines to power silly little things like lights and appliances. Krel had no need to purchase anything, either: Akiridions didn't need to consume solid food, and he could reprogram his serrator to alter his human appearance at will, so buying real clothes was of no use. Akiridion vessels, and Akiridion _people_ for that matter, were perfectly designed to explore the universe, and be able to thrive on any planet, no matter how harsh its environment was. It wouldn’t make much sense if their survival depended on a functioning economy being present on any given planet. As such, Akiridion technology was self-sufficient, as were its creators. So there were no cars to run over his carelessly tossed bike, Krel thought as he placed a hand on the doorknob.

Something made him pause, and he turned to look at the evening sky. The wind rustled through the trees and hummed in the space between houses, as if a single drawn-out note lingering in a distant wind chime; the dimming blues and purples that streaked the sky dripped from the clouds like water and smeared the horizon with blurry trails of color. The buzzing of insects died, birds falling quiet, the shadows seeming to grow longer the longer Krel looked. Something was very wrong. Trepidation stabbed deep at Krel’s core, but shrugging it off forcefully, he reminded himself that whatever it was, it was none of his concern. 

Krel of House Tarron, divinely appointed by the Vanquisher Seklos to rule Akiridion-5, did not exist anymore; there was only Krel, regular and active participant in human society. Just an unremarkable child attending school, enjoying his friends’ company, and riding a bicycle just like any other high school student in the neighborhood. Whatever corruption had permeated the world tonight was simply not his problem.

Krel scowled at seeing his hoverboard propped in the corner as he finally entered the house, mentally bracing himself for what was to come. As always, Ricky and Lucy were standing at attention in the kitchen, faces eagerly turned to the front door as Krel stepped over the threshold.

“Good evening, Krel! Would you like a cookie?” chirped Lucy, right on time. She offered a platter of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, her lipsticked smile affixed to her face. Like clockwork, Ricky’s greeting inevitably followed, with a jaunty tug of his necktie:

“How’s it hanging? Did you learn something new today?” They both grinned at him, awaiting his answers. 

Krel offered a weak smile as he tossed his serrator into a corner and rolled his shoulders, shrugging off his human disguise like slipping off a pair of stiff shoes. The illusion of skin and flesh melted away, his bioluminescence burning through the human guise in an instant. His natural form prickled all over as his core readjusted to the mental perception of different limbs and senses. Krel grimaced as he stretched out his arms; his lower pair of shoulders felt tight and knotted from disuse, a consequence of spending so much time in his human disguise.

“Hi Lucy. No thank you. And, uh, not really, Ricky.” They seemed to wilt slightly, but their smiles did not falter. Without hesitating, Lucy turned to dump her tray in the trash bin, the garbage already dangerously close to overflowing with the same immaculate cookies. She theatrically brushed a nonexistent crumb off her frilly apron before returning to attention, hands folded over her apron. Beside her, Ricky made no movement, still standing rigidly in his tweed suit with a smile.

Krel blinked, mentally adjusting to the difference in height as he made his way past them to slip into the undisguised hallways of the mothership. Logically, he knew that he had programmed this subroutine for the robots specifically to maintain the illusion of human-like normalcy, but somehow he had overlooked just how odd their rehearsed phrases would sound, day after day. Consuming food was a novelty he’d used to enjoy, back when they had first come to Earth, but now it was just uncomfortable to force his body to metabolize energy from solid matter. Furthermore, human civilization was millennia younger than Akiridions, so of course they hadn't discovered anything that would surprise Krel. 

Learn something new? Earth was such a backwater - still fractured into hundreds of separate states, competing for knowledge, resources, camaraderie - and they hadn't even ventured beyond their planet’s single satellite moon yet! Krel might as well be a time traveller, willingly and firmly situated in the distant past, locked in a simpler time. A modern man, sitting happily in a prairie homestead, churning butter day in and day out and trying his best to forget about things like highways and computers. If there was something to be learned here, it would not be in the log-cabin schoolhouse, doing arithmetic with slate and chalk. Krel wanted to laugh.

Luckily, as he entered the communications center and began turning on the array, the reminder of what he was there to do was enough to kill any temptation to make light of his environment. His four hands danced across the controls, sending out the video request, bypassing the restrictions that attempted to block said request, double-checking the time difference, and adjusting the settings. An automated message blinked at him, asking nervously whether he _really_ wanted to attempt to send a direct line to the sole regent of Akiridion-5. Krel tapped the keys to authorize the request, punching the ‘send’ button with slightly more force than necessary. Finally, he slumped into a chair across from the screens, and waited.

Sixteen minutes later, an image opened and a familiar face blinked down at him. Well. At least she answered this time. He straightened in his seat.

“Hello, Krel.”

“Hello, Aja,” he replied with resignation. “How are you doing?”

Krel winced even as the words fell out of his mouth. He knew what the answer would be already, but it was habit to ask such a seemingly innocuous question. Aja’s face creased, the carvings of royalty twisting her disgusted expression. “It could be better, Krel. It certainly could be better. We’ve confirmed the existence of four, maybe five splintered political factions that are still loyal to Morando. It’s the usual insurgent nonsense, what with seeing the general as a martyr and my rule as illegitimate. Then there’s the loyalist rebellion leaders - we’re still finding them in prisons, Krel. Every delson that passes with a loyalist in prison -”

“Is a delson closer to those citizens thinking their queen abandoned them,” Krel finished. Seklos, he really listened to this speech every time, didn’t he? After the second or third time, Aja’s list of grievances was well drummed into his core.

“Exactly. The last thing I need right now is to lose loyal citizens. Some of the pro-Morando sects are trying to form their own _states_ , for Seklos’ sake.”

“Well, why don’t you let them?” Krel responded weakly. Kleb, he was in rare form tonight, wasn’t he? Why didn't he just declare his loyalty to Morando or denounce Seklos’ judgement and see how Aja reacted to _that_?

Aja’s bioluminescent glow flared with fury through the screen. “And allow Akiridion-5 to regress to a pre-galactic state? Did you learn nothing in our history lessons? The first step in a civilization achieving even the most basic forms of space exploration is always political unification without cultural homogenization. It would be fine if they were just expressing their beliefs, but we still don’t know how far they’re willing to go. Which is why -” she lowered her voice, leaning closer - “Vex and Zadra still have to follow me everywhere.”

“They really think someone could try to go after you?” Krel asked uncomfortably. Aja’s eyes narrowed. The possibility of assassination was usually an unspoken subject in their conversations, and Krel normally didn’t even think about it - with Morando dead, the bounty on their heads no longer existed, and since Aja had ascended to the throne and claimed House Tarron’s leadership over one of the most advanced civilizations in their corner of the galaxy, there was suddenly a sharp drop in motivation for assassins to attack her, or Krel by extension. The threat of insurgents from within Akiridion society, however, was still an unknown element.

“You haven’t been home since the counter-rebellion, little brother,” she said finally. “Our world is in pieces, and it is my job to pick up those pieces and reassemble our world. I am trying to unify and heal our grieving people, and the only way I can do that is by asserting the power of the throne. Every delson, I try to bring justice to the victims of Morando’s coup by bringing his lieutenants to court to answer for their crimes. It is not enough, and I am just one person.”

Krel shrank back into his chair, suddenly overwhelmed by rolling waves of guilt and shame. She was entirely justified, of course; Krel’s decision to stay on Earth to experience anonymity and fulfillment in an entirely mundane world was selfish in her eyes. And yet, wasn’t that Aja’s desire from the beginning? Had she not fled her own coronation of inheritance? Sometimes, Aja’s transition from rebellious heir to iron-fisted monarch mystified Krel, and it frightened him a little, too. Why hadn't he experienced the same surge of patriotic desire to help his people? Had Seklos made a mistake when Krel’s code was formed from a royal lineage?

In the sudden silence, Krel noticed the opportunity to interject. “Well, the past few wardons have been very interesting here, Aja. Just the other delson, Steve and Eli managed to put the school principal’s car on the roof of the school...” 

He continued on, trying to cram the events of his life since their last call into as little time as possible. Krel tried to highlight Steve as much as possible in his stories; he figured it was the least he could do, seeing how close Aja had been with him while she was on Earth. He also carefully sidestepped the worst aspects of his life - the struggles with the school administrators and social workers, insisting he was just fine living with the robots; fielding questions from his friends about Aja, carefully spinning cheerful answers and deflecting their repeated requests for video chats; and assuring anyone who asked that he never regretted staying on Earth for a moment. Krel was sure that any hint that he was dissatisfied with his new life would be nothing but insulting to Aja - after all, she was grappling with quite enough, and Krel didn’t want to sound ungrateful for his chance to escape their shared responsibility. He couldn’t reject Akiridion society and human society at the same time, for then where would he go? 

He trailed off in the middle of a particularly spirited tale, noticing Aja’s distant gaze. Recollecting himself, Krel finished, “...and that’s how Eli was bedridden for six delsons.” He coughed lightly to signal that he was done speaking, and Aja blinked as she refocused on the screen. 

“Very interesting, little brother. I’m glad that you are enjoying life on Earth.” Her words were flat. “Who knew that a ball of mud and ice could be so fascinating?”

Krel frowned. “I’m sorry for taking up so much of your time, Aja. You must have a lot to do.”

“You would be correct; I must go. By Seklos’ might,” she dismissed coldly.

“May Gaylen fall,” Krel finished the traditional farewell. He watched with dismay as Aja’s screen blinked out of existence and the control panels dimmed. 

Aja had never used to stand on such ceremony. Ever since she had assumed her position as Queen-elect, she had grown more serious, insisting on reviving ancient customs that were almost never used in day-to-day society on Akiridion-5. Aja justified this habit by pointing out that it would help her consolidate power if Akiridions were reminded of the reason why they had a monarchy in the first place: the royal families of Akiridon-5 could trace their code directly back to Seklos, the legendary savior of the universe who vanquished Gaylen - who was the Creator but also the Scourge - with the strength of Her core. As such, Akiridons who were created from the recombination of royal systems were blessed with the highest faculties possible: more efficient energy allocation, heightened learning sub-functions, and longer lifespans before their cores began to deteriorate. Royal Akiridions, therefore, had a duty to their people to guide and nurture them to their fullest creative and scientific potential. Under the gentle hand of a benevolent ruler, Akiridion-5 could enter a cultural and scientific golden age. But if suffocated under greed and ambition, the citizens of Akiridion-5 would fracture into warring political and religious sects - just as it had been before the unification of House Akram and House Ventis.

It was a delicate balance, much like the eternal struggle of Seklos and Gaylen. Gaylen had crushed stars into dust and created the planets, but became restless and began to tear His creations apart. Only Seklos had dared to fight him with the strength of Her core. Now, locked in a celestial battle for all eternity, Seklos would always emerge victorious - unless, of course, something upset that balance and tipped the scales. 

The responsibility of ruling was much the same, which was why the royal family had to be so careful to keep the balance. Krel’s parents had drilled that into him since the day his processors could understand the world around him, it seemed. House Akram and House Ventis uniting to form one royal line had righted the scales, but General Morando’s coup had upset the balance again.

And now Aja was trying to fix it, guiding their society all alone. Krel raised his upper hands to rub at his eyes, using his lower arms to push himself out of the chair. It was a political nightmare, to be sure. One that was not his nightmare to deal with, he thought vehemently. He left the mothership, deflecting the robots’ practiced lines, and shut himself in his room. He had long ago scoured his space of any and all Akiridion technology, save the serrator that maintained his human disguise - his hoverboard should have been in Aja’s former bedroom, along with his various projects, half-finished and now abandoned. The robots must have brought it out that morning in hopes that he would avoid being late to school. Well, Krel thought to himself as he sat at his desk, if he left the house too late, that was _his_ problem, and he refused to use any alien advantage to solve it. His bicycle worked just fine. 

Scattered across the desk were the remains of a radio, ancient by Akiridion standards, but only a few decades old on Earth. Krel had taken up collecting rejected material from Stuart’s electronics shop to occupy his time - anything that was too rusted or broken to be sold was swept into a bag and brought home with him after school to try to fix. It was hardly a challenging hobby, but coming up with more and more creative solutions with limited Earth technology was interesting, and almost soothing in its simplicity. Krel turned on the lamp, squinting at the disassembled parts as he began sorting the fragments into piles. One hand reached out to flick on the soldering iron, while another opened his toolbox, each type of wire carefully organized in its proper place. His eyes narrowed as he focused, the rise and fall of his chest gradually stilling. Akiridions normally breathed only to use the air for speech, so it was common for them to have motionless lapses in between conversations.

The house fell silent, save for the light sounds of metal clicking against metal as Krel tinkered. With no one to talk to, the robots settled onto the couch, wide grins stretching their faces and the light in their eyes dimming as they went into standby mode, staring unblinkingly at the blank television set, which they had neglected to turn on. An eerie hush fell over their corner of the neighborhood, as if the world was holding its breath. Lights flickered off one by one as the town of Arcadia settled in for the night, the very air seeming to hang motionless as uneasiness hummed in the asphalt and shivered through the branches of trees.

-

Distantly, on a highway approximately fifty miles to the east, a nondescript black van sped down the highway, shattering the silence around it as its expressionless driver pressed the pedal further. Dried mud splattered the bumpers, conveniently obscuring several numbers of the license plates, and inside, the driver appeared to be completely alone, save for a divider blocking the rear passenger seats from view. The radio was turned off. The passenger seat was utterly empty - no papers crammed in the glovebox, no food wrappers littering the floor - and was so spotless the car could have passed as a new rental, if it were not for the mud.

The van would be entirely unremarkable, save for one unnerving fact: the highway, a direct line to the cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco far to the south, was utterly empty, deprived of its usual traffic. The van roared down the asphalt entirely alone and unimpeded, the road stretching emptily for miles in either direction, completely deserted. The sun finally pulled itself beneath the horizon with a sigh, and a pall cast over the scene, blanketing the lone car with shadow as it hurried forward to its unknown destination.


	2. On the Wing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mind the warnings and timeline disclaimer from the beginning.
> 
> Once again, thank you to my incredible audience tester, misfit-toy-haven on Tumblr!
> 
> A few more characters join our story.

As the sun set, a finch fluttered through the sky, swooping through the branches and alighting in the upper boughs of a tall, strong pine tree. There was a wonderful view of the rapidly cooling horizon from this vantage point, as the town lights began to glimmer in the distance and the forest stirred. The breeze groaned as it struggled through the woods, and the little finch clutched ever tighter to its perch as the wind pushed at it halfheartedly. Carried on the air were the usual sounds from far away - the croak of a frog, the rustle of a moth’s wing. All seemed to be in order. Gripping the wood with its claws as the wind grew stronger and more persistent, the bird lowered its head stubbornly, determined to enjoy the evening right here, thank you very much. 

With its beak now pointed down, at the ground, the finch suddenly caught a hint of motion. The bird froze as it stared down into the woods at a straggling procession making its haphazard way through the woods. At that moment, the soft violet fingers of dusk stretched across the sky and pushed their way gently through the soil, casting a dim hue over everything as the sun pulled itself under the curve of the horizon. The sudden loss of light cast these creatures into shadow, and the finch shuffled nervously to keep an eye on the foreboding silhouettes lumbering their way through its suddenly vulnerable forest home. Their limbs were covered not with feathers, fur, or scales, but stone. Yet, their upright forms and glinting eyes spoke of soft flesh, bright intelligence, and spoken word. Their language was unfamiliar, but it crackled into life between turned faces and wide eyes regardless. They peered through the trees with keen glances, mouths opening every now and then to reveal sharp teeth, or ducking a head to show thick, twisting horns. The shambling horde seemed, overall, like a grotesque procession of gargoyles come to life; unnatural creatures that never should have been given intelligence.

It all became too much for the finch - it simply couldn’t take it anymore, and launched itself into the cold air, wings furiously working to transport itself as far away from the auspicious scene as it could.

The lingering figures at the back of the crowd were being ushered forward by a squat, insectoid creature, which paused to glance anxiously at the sky with a flickering gaze as a bird crashed through the leaves, setting off for some distant destination. Blinky’s brows furrowed, his six eyes fixed intently on the sky long after the bird had disappeared from view. 

Suddenly, a flurry of murmurs sparked at the front of the crowd, rippling back through the stream of trolls with halted whispers. There: a spark of movement, ahead through the trees. The scouts had returned from mapping out a path through the forest and the looming mountain peaks ahead. The crowd breathed a collective sigh of relief, taking in the sharp fragments of light glittering on armor as the scouts passed through a soft cascade of moonlight dripping down from the leaves and paused in front of the assembly. The human with a long knife strapped to her waist beckoned the ill-matching parade to take a turn, her steely dark eyes leaving no room for doubt as the trolls obediently followed her lead. The other, the ungainly abomination of Merlin, darted down the side of the crowd as they passed by him, casting unnerved glances out of the corners of their eyes. The Trollhunter ignored them, instead searching until he had found who he was looking for. 

Blinky nearly jumped out of his stone skin when Jim appeared by his side. Jim’s lanky frame allowed him to carefully distribute his weight as he moved, negating the distinctive thudding of heavy limbs that normally signified the approach of any other troll. It was disconcerting, to say the least, for Jim to sneak up on him like that. 

“Is everyone safe? Are they all still with us?” Jim’s low rumble whispered through the night air. The soft glow of his armor cast strange shadows on the trees as he and Blinky plodded along at the back of the group, pausing whenever a troll slowed down too much so as to stay at the back of the group.

Blinky’s six eyes rippled as he closed them one by one, opening them soon after. “Yes, Master Jim. I have kept a sharp eye out. I assure you that not a single troll has passed by me, and by Deya’s Grace, all seems to be quiet tonight.”

Jim nodded slowly, shoulders relaxing as he lifted his head to scan the back of the crowd. “We’ll need a lot more of her grace to make it all the way across the country. Everything’s clear up ahead, for now. We’ll make a slight turn to aim for a mountain pass, but we should be there by sunrise. There’s an abandoned mine everyone can shelter in.”

“A most fortunate turn of events, Master Jim. I have nothing but optimism about the road ahead!” Blinky declared, clutching his crystal staff - a poor substitute for Heartstone, but a marker of his newfound leadership nonetheless - ever tighter. 

Jim gave him a small smile, which soon faded as he looked back ahead. “That makes one of us, Blinky.”

Blinky frowned slightly, giving Jim a sideways glance. “Master Jim, listen to me.” Jim’s ears flicked lazily in his direction, his gaze sliding over reluctantly. Blinky continued firmly, “I know you may not have much hope, but I am confident that Trollmarket will not only survive this journey, but thrive at its new Heartstone. You have proven yourself again and again to be as adept as even the most revered of Trollhunters, and with the fair Claire at your side, I don’t believe there is an enemy in this world you could not strike down. You are Son of Barbara, Bular Slayer, Gunmar’s Bane! Your reputation alone should be sufficient to see us safely through.”

Jim softened a little, his head bowing under the weight of his horns. “I hadn't really thought about that,” he confessed. “Do you really think other trolls have heard about the Eternal Night already?”

“I am sure of it,” Blinky affirmed. “The gnomes and goblins alone must have spread the word to half the continent by now, and once a few storytellers get ahold of the story, I should think the entire world will know within weeks. It is too preposterous a story to make up.”

Jim broke into laughter at that, baring his tusks slightly as his shoulders shook. “I guess that’s true! Thanks, Blinky,” he chuckled, punching Blinky’s shoulder affectionately. Blinky perked up, gratified that he could bring a smile to Jim’s face, at the very least. It was a rare break from form.

The moment shattered as a huge form swooped overhead, sending gusts of wind over the heads of the crowd, awkwardly trying to land on the forest ground without hitting the branches with her huge, tent-like wings. The stalkling crashed heavily to the ground, twigs and leaves raining down around her as she shook off the debris indignantly and folded her wings. Jim sobered up instantly. The stalking twisted her head around to meet Jim’s eyes, and dipped into a deferential nod. “Trollhunter,” she greeted, her slitted eyes fixed on him. Blinky, sensing the tone, quietly hurried ahead so as to place a respectable distance between himself and the pair. 

“Kilura,” he responded. “Walk with me. You noticed something?” 

Kilura had asked to speak with him, at the beginning of the journey, to request that she be allowed to fly above the group. Stalklings were odd trolls, she’d explained, not only because of their resistance to daylight, but also because they were more comfortable in the open air than in enclosed tunnels or on the ground. She had accepted the restrictions of living underground as a humble citizen of Trollmarket, but she couldn’t resist the opportunity to stretch her wings now that one had presented itself. 

A stalkling that had settled down and accepted citizenship, rather than follow their tradition of continuing to hunt aboveground, was a rare and valuable thing, and Jim was keenly aware of this. Jim had allowed her wish, on one condition: she had to fly a day ahead of the rest of the trolls, and report back to him if she noticed anything unusual. Kilura had gladly accepted Jim’s offer, and he had watched her take off into the sky with a creeping feeling of dread, hoping that she would never have to do so.

Now she was here, by his side, and they had barely begun their trek. Deya save him. Jim set his jaw, unconsciously tilting his horns slightly towards Kilura as he waited for her answer.

She shrank away, her step faltering as she noticed the display of aggression. “It could be nothing,” she said cautiously, her beak clacking as she spoke. “The night before last, I had an early start. I flew many leagues ahead, shrouded in clouds and the dark sky. I saw many human villages, and many veins of human transport.”

Jim bit his tongue, reminding himself to be patient. Kilura tended to be more well-spoken than most trolls, and her rambling style of speech could rival even that of Blinky’s. Blinky himself had noticed his frustration before, and had gently clarified to Jim that since stalklings that had “settled down” were so few, those that had integrated with underground society usually made an effort to over-compensate in propriety, so as to dispel the vicious stereotypes of their race.

“I saw a great many paths, whose length and width defy description,” Kilura continued, her eyes searching Jim’s face. “These paths were densely populated with human automobiles, which glittered like dull jewels in the moonlight.”

“Yes, those are roads,” Jim said helpfully. “We’re only a few hundred miles from southern California, which is where everyone lives these days.”

Kilura nodded seriously, her wings rustling dryly. “So it is usual for these paths to be crowded, yes?”

“Of course, but don’t worry,” Jim answered. “We’re not going near any major roads. Claire and I already thought of that.”

“You misunderstand, Trollhunter,” Kilura continued forcefully. “I set off on my flight today just as the sun had begun to descend beyond its peak.”

“During the day?” Jim’s brows narrowed, but Kilura looked insulted.

“My kind are bred to evade detection, Trollhunter. One would have to know that we exist, and be actively searching for us in the sky in order to become aware of my presence. I was not seen.”

“Oh - of course not,” Jim hastily assured, suddenly aware that he had crossed a line. “My apologies, Kilura. Please continue.”

Kilura gave him a sideways glance before she began to speak again. “As I was flying today, crossing the same villages and the same paths, everything was empty. It was as if the humans had all fled and left nothing behind.”

Jim’s eyes widened slightly, but he kept his silence, willing himself to listen to the whole story.

“The villages were deserted,” she went on. “I flew lower and lower, and could neither hear nor smell any human inhabitant. Then I crossed the great paths, and they were abandoned as well. There was no sign of any human automobile. Save for one,” she said suddenly, stopping in her tracks to fix Jim in her wild gaze. “A single human car, following the trail of one other.”

“What do you mean?” asked Jim suddenly as he came to an abrupt halt, his heart beating fast enough to threaten to burst. “Following a trail?”

“I was flying low, low enough to taste the chemicals pouring from the automobile. All else were stale, old scents, from the humans fleeing. Then I made a great effort, and flew faster still, and that is when I detected one other scent - another car had passed through, after the human exodus. It had been following the same path as the one I held in my sights, but was long gone.”

“So the people evacuated, and then a car went through the road, and now there’s another one?” Jim summarized. Kilura gave a short nod of assent. “Well, that’s certainly...unusual, I suppose. Is there any reason to be worried?”

Kilura laughed, a grating, coughing sound. “I should think so, Trollhunter,” she said, her eyes dancing with mirth. “The trail of empty villages and paths leads a clear line to the village we just left.”

“Arcadia?! You couldn’t have _led_ with that?” Jim exclaimed, a few heads turning at the sudden outburst. “And the car was headed there?”

“It appeared so,” Kilura confirmed, “but that is not the most pressing matter, I should think. If the automobile I saw today was following in the wake of another -”

“- then the car that left first would have reached its destination by now,” Jim realized. A chill gripped him, pervading the armor and seeping into his stone skin. He half-turned, to look back at the town he had left behind. They were only a few miles from Arcadia, moving slower than he would’ve liked, what with the children and elderly, and every troll weighed down by the burden of personal belongings. Fear crept up his spine, spiking uncomfortably in his horns. “If something has the authority to evacuate whole cities and block off roads like that, that can’t be good,” he muttered anxiously to himself. He’d naïvely assumed that the Battle of the Eternal Night had gone unnoticed by anyone outside of Arcadia, but apparently it was too much to hope for. Maybe they were just coming to check out the weird meteor shower that had happened a few weeks ago? No, he was never that lucky. 

Jim came to a swift decision. “Thank you, Kilura. I appreciate it.” She ruffled her feathers modestly. “Would you mind flying back to Arcadia and trying to track down that other car? Do you think you could find it?”

“Of course, Trollhunter,” she dipped her head again.

“We’re going to try to take shelter in the mountain pass. Meet me there once you’ve found the car. Try to see if you can find out anything about what they want, but keep yourself safe. Come back within the hour.”

“My pleasure,” Kilura responded, stretching her wings. Crouching low to the ground, she took a few bounding leaps and launched herself into the air, quickly becoming a shrinking speck in the sky as Jim watched her swoop into a graceful arch, turning over in the air and soaring back toward Arcadia.

Jim shook his head irritably, breaking into a half-jog to catch up with Blinky, who was clearly straining to hear his conversation, trying and failing to be subtle about it. “Master Jim!” Blinky exclaimed, a false grin stretching his face. “Did Kilura impart any wisdom?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Jim replied, taking one of the cloth bags Blinky was struggling to haul along. They were crammed with books and scrolls that Blinky had deemed essential, and Jim swung it over his shoulder as he quickened his pace. “Listen, we need to get to the abandoned mine as fast as possible. It could be nothing, but I’d really rather not risk it.”

“A wise choice, Master Jim!” Blinky said loudly. Raising his voice, he then addressed the crowd: “My friends, please make haste!” There were pockets of grumbling that bubbled up, but the trolls began walking ever so slightly faster, hurrying along in the direction that Claire was directing them in. Jim rushed ahead, scooping up a young troll that was lagging behind and setting him on his shoulders. The small troll gave a shriek of delight, and its father gave Jim a grateful look. Jim paid no attention, instead picking up the bags that the child had dropped in one hand and setting a swift pace. 

Blinky swallowed, briefly looking back over his shoulder at the distant glimmering lights of Arcadia. The spectacle seemed to warp, the lights wavering as if burning coals. The resulting illusion gave the appearance of smoldering embers on the brink of igniting. Blinky quickly turned back to the front, doing his best to ignore the premonition and gently ushering a troll forward who had fallen behind.

-

Back in the direction whence they came, Kilura flew, sharp eyes scanning the ground. The chilled night air whispered over her wings and trailed in swirling eddies behind her as she carefully angled her wings to catch an updraft. The human village below her seemed curiously empty, but she could tell it was still inhabited by occasional clues here and there - the flicker of movement as a human closed the curtains over a window, the distant slam of a door, the sudden death of a light snuffed out. But where was the automobile?

Falling to her side, Kilura banked into a wide curve, turning so she could survey the western edge of the village. Peering down at the ground, she caught a hint of sound in the wind - a soft _pop_ , followed by an odd sort of whining hiss that grew louder and louder. The bullet was so small, she couldn’t see it until it was too late. 

With a sudden bolt of pain, her shoulder exploded in agony. Kilura clamped her beak shut instinctively to keep from crying out, flexing her wings to swerve to the left. Distantly, she thought she could feel fragments of rock falling from the cratered hole the projectile had punched into her body. Straightening her wings, heavily favoring her right side, Kilura blinked away tears and glared at the ground. Stalklings were tough, but a wound that close to a wing could easily ground her. She didn’t have long, but the single-minded pursuit of her kind was legendary - she refused to return to the Trollhunter until she had learned something about what troubled him. 

Focusing, Kilura shook away the angry buzz to squint at the point where the sound had come from. Black spots swarmed her vision, but she caught glimpses - it was a human, clad in padded armor, aiming a weapon at the sky, looking up - but the swarm of his fellows around him were all staring at something on the ground - the automobile was parked just outside one of the houses - they were at the end of a path - one of them was carrying a black bag - another _pop_ , but this time Kilura knew to jerk to one side, feeling the soft brush of air delicately avoid her left foreleg. She had seen enough.

Kilura turned sharply, veering back toward the mountains that sat proudly at one end of the valley, clouds caught in the peaks like sheepswool in her teeth. She flew low and fast, grimly clinging to the last remaining scraps of her strength. If those humans knew to watch for threats from the air - and be able to detect a stalkling mid-flight, no less - this was a much more serious danger than she could imagine. The Trollhunter needed to hear about this. 

The forest began to sprawl under her, sloping upwards to the cliffs that bordered the village limits. Kilura struggled on, beginning to slow down. Her shoulder was excruciating, and her right wing hung straight and motionless, parallel to the ground, her left wing flapping slowly to compensate. The dark spots that had clouded her vision before returned in full force, and flecks of white froth formed at the corner of her mouth as she gasped raggedly, straining to make it over the crest of the cliff. 

Kilura barely made it, but just as she swooped over the plateau crowning the cliff’s edge, her wing gave out, and she crashed to the ground, skidding and flipping over herself in a chorus of screams from her injured shoulder. Kilura slammed to a stop when she hit a tree with a splintering _thud_ , hard and unforgiving, and lay there for a moment, panting with her tongue lolling heavily into the dust and eyes wild and unfocused.

The white-hot flare of her shoulder died down a little, and Kilura reached out slowly, gingerly stretching the limb, and planted her foot firmly onto the dirt, tensing every claw to dig into the dust and anchor herself with her talons. She gathered her legs under her, and shakily rose to her feet, right wing dragging by her side, limp and useless. Kilura lifted her head, vision hazy, and bowed forward, her horns pointed to the world at large. She lifted her left leg, and took a step forward. Then the right hind leg. 

Step. 

Step. 

Her left wing was locked against her side, right wing scraping harshly against the ground. Kilura opened her mouth slightly to taste the air, and she easily caught the scents of hundreds of trolls, all mixed together. One human. One abomination. 

Step. 

Step. 

She had to tell the Trollhunter what she had seen. Kilura dragged herself into the forest, the uncaring moon shining above. 

Step. 

Step. 

Her sleek form was gradually swallowed up by the shadows, the rhythmic thud and scrape echoing into the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The illustration for this chapter is delayed as I have been working on the painting for Chapter 3. I will update this note when this chapter's illustration is done.
> 
> As always, comments are much appreciated, as this is my first work. I'd love to hear what you think so far!
> 
> Thank you for reading. The next update will be Tuesday the 28th.


	3. Be Careful, Little Prince

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Krel is interrupted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mind the warnings. 
> 
> Thank you again to misfit-toy-haven for the advice.

The spluttering grumble of a combustion engine reverberated through the calm evening, the vibrations of the raucous sound rippling through the walls of the mothership and worming their way in through the cracks in its façade. Inside, Krel was still seated at his desk, nearly finished with assembling the radio. Akiridions only needed to quiet their cores for a few horvaths every now and again, to give their processors a rest, so there was still time before he had to depart for the human schoolhouse with its slate and chalk. 

The soundwaves sighed into his room, gently fluttering against the borders of Krel’s light-and-color body. The processors in his core that monitored tactile sensations registered the input, and flurried through lines of code to find the proper translation to give his consciousness the sense of sound. All this took mere fractions of a millisecond, and Krel looked up from his work at the interruption. His eyes stared out his window, the processors effortlessly adjusting his field of vision, and he caught the flash of headlights on his street before they were abruptly shut off with a screech of rubber tires against the asphalt.

Quite late for anyone to be coming home in his nearly deserted corner of the neighborhood, Krel observed. He raised his shoulders and slumped back over, mimicking the gesture he’d picked up from his circle of human friends as he returned to delicately stripping a wire. As he liked to maintain, it was none of his business. Unless they physically knocked on his front door, indicating as humans would that they desired to communicate with him, he wouldn’t pry. 

There was a knock on the front door.

-

Oliver Dauberon was beginning to think that this was a mistake.

‘The West coast is where everything is happening,’ they all said. ‘California, no less! Home of Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and beautiful scenery! You’ll have it all at your fingertips!’ Oliver snorted and rested his face on the steering wheel, careful not to accidentally press the horn. His glasses dug into his face as he breathed, the rush of stale air loud in the deserted car. He flatly refused to watch the scene unfolding beyond the windshield - the less he saw, the less he knew. He was exhausted from driving for hours, disregarding the speed limits out of sheer terror of failing his employers. Commuting to his job all the way from Arcadia, then _back_ here for some crucial reason, then returning to his work was asinine. He’d probably just sleep under his desk tonight. He didn’t think he could bear driving all the way back to his cramped studio after this, only to have to return in the morning a few hours later. At least they were paying him overtime. Jesus. How had it come to this?

He knew perfectly well, of course. Oliver was a fresh hire, a fledgling geneticist who’d proudly graduated with his master’s degree only a year ago, bright-eyed and ready to take on the world. Then came the deafening silence as he sent out his résumé to hundreds of potential employers, only to be met with being ignored or outright rejected by every single one of them. He’d burned through his meager savings in six months, been forced to come to terms with his financial situation, had moved in with his parents, and thereafter tried to avoid meeting their judgemental gaze as he slouched around the house, acutely aware of his shortcomings.

Then came the miracle letter - some obscure company had sent him an offer, promising him the prestige of working on the cutting edge of his field and a guaranteed six-figure salary in ten years, no less. All he had to do was sign a bizarre contract: mountains of non-disclosure agreements and a binding clause that forced him to remain with the company until the day he died, upon which his family was legally barred from suing the company but would receive a modest pension. He was free to leave his job, technically, but he would forever be barred from seeking employment elsewhere and receive only poverty wages for his trouble. That part was odd. Oliver couldn’t think of how a company could possibly enforce that. But there were no other desirable opportunities for employment, and Oliver had been desperate, and the offer sounded good enough - almost like tenure, right? Hence moving all the way from Vermont to California. To a quiet town with cheap rent. Right.

In hindsight, telling his employers about the increasingly bizarre events in the town he had just moved to was probably his worst decision yet. Instead of being comfortably seated at a cushy desk, doing research, he had been designated to this new project. Chasing possibilities that Oliver had probably hallucinated from too much espresso. God knew why his employers had been so interested in his incoherent ramblings when he’d attempted to make conversation in the break room, insisting over a pot of burned coffee that he’d seen moving gargoyles stalk through the streets and glowing figures summon meteors like an absurd version of the apocalypse. He’d just wanted to talk about something interesting, and the nonsense he was pretty sure he’d dreamed recently felt like a safe bet. Even when his excited coworkers had informed him afterward that his descriptions bore an uncanny resemblance to what some other witnesses had reported, Oliver had brushed it off as a mass hallucination. Arcadia was probably sitting on a reservoir of natural gas that was leaking. His employers didn’t seem to think so.

He heard the soft _pop_ of a silenced gun being fired, almost like a firework, and buried his head further in his arms, curly brown hair pressing hot against his face. They’d told him that no shots were to be fired. Oliver tried to focus. He was the newest employee, so logically he was the one pressed into all these questionable errands. He certainly wasn’t using his degree to chauffeur these idiots around. He just had to stick with it. Think of the salary that would await him if he stayed. The job security. The benefits.

One of the mentioned idiots knocked on the door up the driveway. That, at least, was part of the plan. Beyond that, Oliver had mostly tuned out the details. He didn’t need to know. He squeezed his eyes shut and listened to the sound of his own breathing. In. Out. In. Out.

-

Krel almost called for Mother to show him what the visitor looked like, but stopped himself. Mother was dead, and this may as well just be a normal house now. If he wanted to see outside, he’d have to go all the way into the mothership to the viewport to operate the cameras manually, and human etiquette dictated that he didn’t have that much time to answer the door. He pushed himself back from his desk, grumbling quietly at being forced to abandon his project. Krel walked into the living area, the two robots sitting motionless on the couch. He made a noise, somewhere between a chirp and a whirr, that signaled them to default into the interior of the mothership. He’d rather avoid the barrage of questions that inevitably came whenever someone noticed them, especially if it were a social worker. They liked the idea of parental figures, but once they realized that Krel could alter the bots’ code as he pleased, the concept became much less appealing to them. Krel didn’t see what the fuss was about - it was incredibly convenient to add subroutines as he wished. Like now.

Once the bots were out of sight, Krel glanced toward the closet that Lucy always placed his serrator in. Should he greet them in human disguise or his natural form? Humans usually preferred interacting with him as a human boy, but only if they were unaware that he was Akiridion. Those that could recognize him as a human were usually disappointed at seeing his disguise, expressing disquieting fascination at his “real” glowing body peering down at them with discomfort. Then again, if he greeted someone as a human and they later found out he was Akiridion, they could get angry and accuse him of misleading them. So Krel usually left the house only in his human disguise. But then, whoever it was had approached him in his own home, so they were probably already clued in to his extraterrestrial origin.

Before he could come to a decision, the door was violently struck. The hinges rattled, the doorknob clattered, and Krel thought he heard the sound of wood splintering. Krel immediately shrank back, but then berated himself for his cowardice. This was a direct show of intimidation, and if he wished to keep his tenuous place in human society, he had to be able to defend himself against rude neighbors. He’d certainly faced down more dangerous creatures. It was probably just some upset human, here to pound on his door and express their distress at finding out that an _alien_ lived in their neighborhood now. The routine was familiar, although normally the spitting protests came at a more reasonable hour. Krel set his shoulders back, drawing himself to his full height and clenching his bottom pair of hands into fists as he marched to the door and flung it open, drawing a breath to hurl vitriol at whoever saw fit to disturb him like this in the middle of the night.

He never got the chance. Krel saw the butt of a rifle just before it slammed into his face, his processors frantically sparking _pain pain pain_ as he stumbled back. An unseen hand reached out and grabbed one of his ankles, giving a sharp yank to pull his gangly limbs out from under him, and Krel fell backwards and smashed to the ground, head striking the hard floor. He didn’t get a chance to recover from the shock, as suddenly there were strong hands all over him, seizing his arms, legs, and middle, and they were all tugging and hauling him out from the doorframe, and there were cuffs encircling his wrists and ankles and grinding shut, and then all became dark as cloth covered his face and body and he was shoved to and fro. The sound of a zipper reached his core from far away, and suddenly he was being carried in a tight fabric embrace. A bag - he was in a bag. Like a dead person.

Krel blinked past the pain, wincing at the slight motion, and he heard a faint _click_ as his front door was shut. He wanted to laugh at the polite gesture, wanted to thank the brutal humans for ensuring that bugs wouldn’t enter his house, but opening his mouth only released a shuddered gasp, and he uselessly tried to curl in on himself to instinctively protect his core. The bag began swinging, the heavy boots of whoever was carrying him jarring Krel with each step. Thankfully, it was a short journey, and for a moment Krel felt weightless as the bag was heaved upward. Then it came crashing down, on what felt like a metal surface, and Krel saw flashes of light as the pain flared again, eventually setting into a deep ache in his core. 

He sucked in a ragged breath, more for comfort than use, and flexed his hands behind him. They had trapped his limbs in awkward positions, binding his top right hand to the bottom left, and vice versa. A chain clinked, the sound traveling down his back to attach to the restraints on his ankles, and Krel was struck by the absurdity of it all. He had done everything right - obediently assumed his human disguise, enduring the tight feeling of being compressed into a false puppet every day as he sat through horvaths of scheduled lessons on topics he’d mastered the moment his core had downloaded the necessary knowledge to function as a royal Akiridion. Krel had kept to himself most of the time. He’d done nothing wrong. He’d even made human friends, and had genuinely enjoyed their company. Hot tears pricked at the corners of his eyes - a consequence of unconsciously absorbing too much moisture from the atmosphere - as Krel thought of his friends. Eli, Steve, Toby ... would they miss him when they discovered his absence? Would they mourn? 

The gods must have finally taken notice of his outright defiance. Krel clung to the legends of Gaylen the Creator and Seklos the Vanquisher, as did any Akiridion in an unfamiliar environment. Was this their way of punishing him for abandoning his people? Who was he to denounce the judgement of Seklos, who rendered Her decision the moment She created his consciousness from the recombination of two royals? It was as close to a divine designation of one’s life as you could get on Akiridion-5. Other Akiridions were free to contribute to society as they saw fit, but not royals - they had too many blessings from their holy lineage, and were expected to utilize those blessings for the good of their people. He’d used to support that system. He’d looked forward to his coronation so much. How could he have expected to simply walk away from it all, unpunished?

Krel was ripped from his musings as more pairs of boots hit the floor around him, shaking the ground as they crowded around his bag. He heard the slam of two doors on either side of him, then two thumps as someone knocked on a wall. An engine choked to life, the floor vibrating, and Krel realized that he was in a car. Surrounded, trapped, and on his way to horizons unknown. He briefly entertained the idea of trying to break free, but the cold barrel of a gun pressing against his calf quickly dispelled that idea. He had no weapon anyway, no defense. The car jerked into motion, and Krel hunched over himself in the bag, eyes wide and unseeing, fear gripping his core, listening to the trundle of the undercarriage as the car carried him away.

-

The two knocks jolted Oliver from sleep, slamming his head back against the soft headrest as he wrested himself from the peaceful doze he had been slipping into. His glasses slipped down his face, and Oliver frantically adjusted them while he fumbled for the gear stick with his other hand. The two knocks were the signal - they had completed the mission. Cranking the van into drive, Oliver slammed the gas pedal, twisting the steering wheel to swerve around and thunder out of the cul-de-sac. Who was going to hear them? he thought hysterically. It was only three in the morning, for God’s sake.

The black van skidded around a corner to wail down a main road, headed for the highway system about thirty minutes out of town. Arcadia was fairly isolated, Oliver thought to himself as he stared down the road, about as close to the sticks as you could get without going upstate. That was the only reason he could afford to live without a roommate at the moment. The hour-long commute was a real downer, but he knew the risks when he’d accepted a job in California.

The mundane thoughts calmed him, and he resolutely clenched his hands, white-knuckled on the wheel, determined to not only cope with but thrive in his new job. He didn’t need to think too hard about what he’d just been an accomplice to, though - he wasn’t assigned to this particular project anyway. Instead, he began composing a grocery list. Lettuce. Rice. Bananas. Milk. He was just another citizen, and this was just his job. He was just performing labor in exchange for wages. Whatever came about as the result of his labor was his employers’ business, not his own.

Oliver risked a glance out the window as they left the town limits, hoping to catch a glimpse of the other van. Of course he couldn’t see it anywhere. He didn’t even know where the other team’s target had gone. It was none of his concern anyway, he reminded himself - at least not until they made it back and began the real work. Then, he would finally be able to really _do_ something. All his years of sleepless nights, of agonizing over notes and flipping through textbooks, of washing dishes to pay for grad school and taking summer classes to get ahead, all of it would pay off. His employers had promised the bleeding edge of science, and Oliver liked to think that they had targeted him not only for his desperation, but for his qualifications as well. Here, at last, was his opportunity to finally prove it. To use his expertise - to change the world! Wasn’t that fair, for him to so desperately pursue knowledge as a scientist and as a human being?

His eyes narrowed, flooring the gas as he exited a ramp and entered the highway system proper. It was thoughtful, really, for his employers to clear traffic like this. They’d insisted it was to protect the integrity of the projects, but Oliver quietly allowed himself the indulgence of thinking that someone out there was trying to make his job easier. If he had to suffer the indignity of acting as a clandestine getaway driver, it made him feel a little better to not have to deal with any other cars on the road. A flash of light glinted off the rearview mirror, and Oliver’s eyes flicked up to it, revealing the headlights of an identical black van pulling onto the highway. Oliver almost smiled at that. One other car he could deal with. Returning so early meant that they’d secured their own subject with no problem - the subject that Oliver would get to work with. Finally, it felt as though something was going right. A small comfort, blooming warm and reassuring against his chest as he drove into the night. Forget his empty fridge, forget his unpublished papers. This simple operation was going perfectly. At the moment, that alone was pure bliss.

-

The floor rattled under Krel, sending needles of pain through his body, and he silently cursed whatever Akiridion had had the genius idea of giving their processors the ability to interpret pain. If only he hadn't been so surprised and hurt by that rifle to the face. If only he’d had his sister’s grace to slip out of the hands’ grasp and fight back. If only he hadn't dismissed Ricky and Lucy. 

He’d played with the blanks’ coding so much, bored and lonely after Aja’s departure, that they were now mere shells, their former personalities locked away behind lazily installed programs. He could picture them now, standing just inside the mothership, waiting for Krel to invite them back into the living room - and if he didn’t give them a signal in twenty horvaths, they’d return to the couch and go into standby mode until he activated them again. He hadn't wanted them to get in his way. Useless.

Krel strained against the handcuffs, but they held firm. The scraping click he’d heard when the humans put them on meant they had mechanical locks, and a quick mental venture from his core confirmed the fact. He sagged with fatigue - electronic locks he could work with, use his core to communicate, break free. But regular old metal and chains? Surely his species didn’t have such a glaring design flaw, so as to be so easily confined by physical restraints. His breathing, a habit he’d picked up from human society that seemed strangely comforting at times like these, picked up. It was hot and dark in the bag. He couldn’t see anything. If only he could get a sense of his surroundings. 

_Think_ , Krel! What did he have? Only his own body. But then again, an Akiridion body was a living testament to their peoples’ mastery over the sciences. Krel forced himself to slow down his frantic panting, trying to calm himself so he could take stock. His core was still safe and undamaged. That was something. What did his core have? An Akiridion core was, as he knew, an expertly constructed quantum computer that housed a sentient consciousness, expressed through massively complex stores of equations and lines of code. They interpreted their environment through powerful processors embedded in the core, and when air was in short supply, they could talk through small speakers. The core also housed the miniscule lenses that projected an Akiridion’s body, which could best be described as an extremely advanced hologram. Since their bodies were nothing more than light and color, they interacted with the environment through subtle manipulations of gravity fields that came as easily to them as walking. Most of the time, Krel didn’t even think about it - it was a subconscious function, to perceive his body as real, and he didn’t think he could ‘stop being solid’ even if he wanted to. 

But perhaps it was his only option. Krel reached deep into his core, shuddering at the foreign sensation of retreating into his mind. His field of vision suddenly shifted, then went completely black - the light filtering in through the fabric of the bag vanished. The feeling of the cold floor and coarse fabric beneath him, the pinch of the handcuffs, it all disappeared, replaced by a completely motionless, weightless sensation as his processors adjusted to feed him sensory input from his core. He was floating in an abyss, with nothing but cool darkness around him. Was this what his parents had felt when Morando had struck them down? Was this what it felt like to die? 

Krel gasped and raced back out of his mind, blinking furiously as his vision returned and his body felt real again. No. That wouldn’t work. Even if he wanted to return to the horrible feeling of being confined to his core - he winced at the thought - he had overlooked the basic fact that his core was a solid object, so even if he managed to dissolve the solid borders of his hologram body, his core would still be trapped in this awful bag. How incredibly stupid of him. 

Maybe a different approach, one that wasn’t the worst idea ever thought of by a supposedly flawless system of mathematical ingenuity. Krel tried to think, his head aching. Energy - he had energy. Akiridions were self-sustaining, powered by tiny reservoirs of nuclear fusion built into their cores. They could only use a fraction of the power available to them at a time, and it was through this moderation that they could live for hundreds of keltons without issue. Theoretically, Krel had slightly more control over his energy output as a royal. It might shave a bit of time off his natural lifespan, but then again, who knew how long he would live if they reached their destination?

Concentrating deeply, Krel took a slow, deep breath, and reached for his core again. This time, he knew precisely where to look - the energy banks, there. Hesitantly, Krel extended his mind to assess his situation. The energy reservoirs appeared, in his mind’s eye, as a massive, wrathful storm, a churning hurricane held back by a delicate border. He looked at it with trepidation, suddenly doubtful of his own knowledge of Akiridion functions. Was this really a good idea? He drew closer, uncertain. Did he have a choice? Looking down at the thin border that kept the energy contained, he reached down and reluctantly smudged the line, just a touch. A single drop of power peeled free from the raging storm and Krel quickly redrew the border, not wanting the entire dam to break. The particle of energy hovered in the air, paralyzed by inaction, and Krel steeled his nerves. Then he reached out to consume it.

It was if his entire body exploded. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t see - all he could feel was the burning, splitting heat that consumed his entire body. His hands flared, white-hot against the cuffs, and although Krel couldn’t see his own face, his eyes had turned solid electric-blue, vapor pouring from his mouth as the heat instantly boiled the moisture that had collected in his body from the damp Earth atmosphere. His mouth tasted metallic, as if molten aluminum were dripping onto his tongue. 

Breathlessly, Krel tried to gather himself, becoming somewhat aware of the searing light that was blazing from his skin, threatening to tear the seams of his body from the inside. The sheer rush of raw power was overwhelming, but Krel had the vague notion that if he could just expel it from his body, put it out into the world instead, he could escape. Pressure mounted in his head as he tried to shove the energy out of himself, the heat intensifying and igniting the bag, and as flames erupted around him, Krel sat bolt upright and opened his mouth to scream. 

-

Oliver wiped the sweat from his brow, nervously checking that the temperature-control system was still functioning properly. It didn’t display any problems, but the van was suddenly sweltering. His glasses were in danger of fogging up, which would be more of an issue if the road wasn’t perfectly clear. There were shouts from the back of the car, and he glanced at the rearview mirror, shocked by what he saw. A solid wall of striking blue light and orange flame was pressing against the reinforced divider, seething against the constraints. Oliver shrieked in fear and floored the gas pedal, knuckles white as he clutched the wheel, the van leaping forward with an abrupt jolt. He heard bumps and groans from the back, along with screams and curses. He wasn’t paid enough for this. Why weren’t the guards getting the subject under control? 

“Just hit it again!” came the angry snarl, and Oliver relaxed for a moment. Then the sound of a solid _thwack_ , and everything went white.

-

When Oliver came to, the first thing he registered was that the van had stopped moving, and the horn was blaring in his ear. He was slumped over the steering wheel, one cheek pressed against it. The back of his head felt like a particularly nasty sunburn, the soft fabric collar of his shirt rubbing painfully against angry blisters. The back of his mouth tasted of metal. He shakily lifted his head, and the horn stopped. It was terrifyingly silent, now, save for a persistent ringing. That was probably temporary. He hoped. Oliver’s glasses were hanging around his chin. He placed them on his face with a trembling, dusty hand. One of the lenses had a crack forking through the glass. Oliver slowly looked at the door, reaching for the handle and pulling on it. The lock jammed. He hit it with a fist. Then again, and again, over and over as he became more frustrated. Everything had gone wrong. He punched the door one more time, sucking in a breath. He had to assess the damage.

When he grabbed the handle this time, the door opened, albeit with a screech of warped metal. Oliver stumbled into the road, looking back in the direction of Arcadia. The other van was rapidly approaching, and he waved halfheartedly at it, hoping that the other driver would disregard their strict instructions and stop to help.

No such luck. The van sped past him, ignoring his pleas. Oliver was on his own. Grimacing, he picked his way to the back of his own car, and faltered as he took in the wreckage. The back of the van was... _gone_. The armored divider was still in place - it had probably saved his life - but the walls and ceiling of the back section had been blown out with extreme prejudice, and most of the guards were missing. Those of them that were still present were...well. They were slumped over, charred beyond recognition, the flesh flayed from their papery bones. Soot covered what remained of their corpses, scorch marks all pointing accusingly to an unmoving heap of blue light in the middle of the floor.

Very calmly, Oliver walked to the side of the highway and threw up. As he retched, he turned his head slightly to squint back down the dark road. This would be a hell of a time for whoever was in charge of cleanup. By the light of the streetlights, he could see a huge black mark marring the highway back down a ways, marking the precise spot where the explosion had occurred. Then, the tire tracks of torn rubber as Oliver had been knocked out, the van swerving, shedding sheets of reinforced metal from its walls, before rolling to a slow stop here. It was an ugly mess of damning evidence.

Spitting with disgust, trying to keep his stomach under control, Oliver straightened and wiped his mouth. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want anything to _do_ with this. But the contract had been very clear - if he left his job, the company’s legal protection of him would end. He tried not to think about whether the guards had had families. He had a job to do, and by God, he was going to do it, if only because he had no other choice. He exhaled. 

Tamping down his fear, Oliver approached the back of the van to examine the subject. It appeared to be unconscious, knocked out by one of those idiots. That was the likely cause of the explosion. Now, though, it seemed to be breathing peacefully, its bioluminescence dimmed to a steady, but faint glow. The duffel bag had been reduced to ashes around it, and from what Oliver could see of its arms twisted behind its back, the cuffs were all melted to lumps of solid metal.

Doing his best to ignore the tremor in his hands as he reached out, Oliver gently scooped the subject into his arms, cradling it against his white coat almost tenderly. It was far lighter than he’d expected. Thank God it appeared to be unharmed - his employers wouldn’t like it if he brought back a damaged subject. Looking at its face, Oliver’s heart softened. It had a round, almost human-like face. It reminded him of his nephew.

But unlike his nephew, this _thing_ was dangerous. Deadly, even. Shaking his head, disgusted with himself, Oliver walked around to the passenger side, awkwardly shifting the subject so he could wrench the door open and slide the subject into the seat. It slumped over, almost like the dead guards in the back, and Oliver cursed to himself as he reclined the seat so it would look less terrifyingly limp. Yes, it could almost be resting now. He reached over to buckle it in, and suddenly became very aware that it was watching him.

He nervously flicked his gaze to meet its eyes - its open, black eyes. The subject stared at him, wordlessly, without blinking. A beat passed. Oliver didn’t know what to do. He licked his lips. 

“Please go back to sleep,” he whispered hoarsely, hoping against hope that it would listen to his fruitless appeal. It watched him for a moment, almost judgmental in its cold assessment of him. It even opened its mouth as if to communicate, but couldn’t manage more than a rasping hiss of air. A faint look of frustration crossed its face. Then, to his surprise, its blue-rimmed pupils slid upwards, closing its eyes with a sigh. He wasn’t sure if it had done that for him, or because it was simply exhausted.

Oliver didn’t move for a long time, still bent over with the seatbelt fastener in his hands. When he was quite sure it had fallen asleep again, he buckled it in, ever so delicately, and backed out of the passenger side. He closed the door softly, pressing to make sure it clicked shut. 

Retreating to the driver’s side, Oliver got back into his own seat, closing the door and reaching for the key. Then he paused. He didn’t want to lock the doors, given how hard it had been to open the door in the first place after the van was damaged, but he had to secure the front of the van somehow. He pressed the button to roll up the windows, but only watched in dismay as the rim of his window coughed and spat out fragments of glass. So. No locks, no windows. Glowing test subject asleep in the passenger’s side. Fantastic.

Praying that the car would start, Oliver turned the key, listening with rising hope as the engine gurgled to life. He gingerly depressed the gas pedal, resisting the urge to pump a fist in victory as the van rolled back onto the highway. He was back on track. He was not going to get fired. After expending that much energy and losing consciousness, the subject would most likely sleep all the way there, and then it’d be taken off his hands and he could get down to business. Oliver wasn’t going to get struck down today. Perhaps, he dared to imagine, nothing else would go wrong.

-

The car pulled away from the trail of wreckage, heaving exhaust as it crawled down the highway, the other van leading far ahead. A sibilant breeze curled through the air, lightly dancing over the carnage of melted steel and blackened flesh that littered the warm asphalt. Flies already buzzed over the shambles, eager for a taste as birds curiously hopped closer, tilting their heads as if to question their luck. 

The sky was blushing a dusty pink, the rosy fingers of dawn creeping across the clouds as the sun began to peer over the horizon and painted vivid color across the distant sky. The sunlight washed over the world, illuminating the empty towns and foreboding barricades that lined the highway as the two vans moved on. A new day was beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next update will be Tuesday, August 4th. The illustration for this chapter can be found [here](https://taggerbug.tumblr.com/post/624920588289490944/be-careful-little-prince-illustration-for).
> 
> Comments are much appreciated. :)


	4. Light in A Major

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Jim is having difficulty adjusting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll stop adding these warnings soon, I promise. Once again, this is your reminder that this fic is going to be fairly dark. If you have specific questions about content warnings, please feel free to leave a comment or send a private message to my tumblr @taggerbug. Otherwise, please enjoy :)

It was getting late by the time they reached the abandoned mine. Stacks of steel bars and rusting ore carts were piled haphazardly around the tunnel entrance, decaying wood creaking in the breeze. Jim slowed down, dropping his bags, mouth slightly open as he sucked in a breath. He crouched low to help the troll child clamber down from his shoulders, and it grabbed its bags and ran off without a word. Toppling slightly to the side, Jim straightened himself, scowling as he saw Claire give him a questioning glance at his loss of balance from her side of the trail, where she was ushering the stream of trolls into the tunnel.

He hated to admit it, even to himself, but the transition from living as a human to being a troll was much more difficult than he let on. Merlin’s spell had stretched Jim’s skeleton and plated his bones, drawing him up to over two feet above his previous height. As a result, his center of gravity had completely shifted. His muscles had been braided together and rearranged with impunity, now stretching cordlike under his skin with unfamiliar strength that distorted the contours of his face and lent a terrifying power to his every action. The stone skin that covered his body was thick and dense, clinging like tar to his limbs and creeping into his mouth. His head had taken the worst of it - his skull had seemingly dissolved and been molded into a sturdier shape; the jaw thick and protruding to accommodate the spadelike tusks that jutted between his teeth, the base of his cranium unnaturally reinforced to counterbalance the weight of his horns that twisted from the top of his frontal bone and gave his brow ridge a heavy cast. Even the interior of his head wasn’t safe - his palate had been scooped wide as if with a spoon, broadening the apertures that now allowed him to keep his breath steady and deep even in combat, and distinguish between scents like other trolls.

The high of fighting Gunmar had long since worn off, and without the rush of fear and excitement that had punctuated the first several days following Jim’s metamorphosis, he was like a little child learning how to walk again. Whenever he moved, the phantom sensations of thin, brittle limbs made him freeze, lurch forward with the force of it, and glance down at his body to reassure himself that he was no longer so soft and fragile. Every casual wave of an arm or curl of his shoulders was now faster and heavier than he was used to, resulting in too many crushed objects held in his unsuspecting grip or crumpled tree branches that he’d unthinkingly reached for to right himself. It scared him. He hadn't held Claire’s hand in weeks.

The trolls walking around him had all had a lifetime to grow accustomed to their stone bodies, whereas Jim had had less than a month. He thought of Blinky’s fascinated tone, telling him that a naturally-born troll at his age and size would be considered barely more than an infant, and winced. The remark hadn't bothered him at the time, since he had been so focused on his troll body’s advantages over his human form, but he saw the truth of it now, as he swayed slightly on his feet. He only prayed that the long, remote trek ahead of him would give him a chance to grow accustomed to his new stride.

Something slid over his left arm, and it took all of Jim’s self-control to not instinctively draw his glaives and stab at it. He looked to his left sharply, and was met with Claire looking at him with concern. Her hand moved from his forearm to his hand, and she laced her fingers through his as she spoke.

“How was your walk?” Her voice was soft, reassuring, a soothing balm to his agitation.

Jim froze and breathed deeply, collecting his thoughts before he responded. “Mostly uneventful, but we might have a problem.”

Claire’s hand tightened around his, but her tone remained steady. “What kind of problem?”

“It could be nothing,” Jim echoed Kilura’s words, careful to not so much as twitch a finger. “Do you remember the stalking that asked to fly above us?”

Claire frowned for a moment, watching the trolls as they apprehensively entered the mine; Blinky’s shouted commands drifted faintly from the tunnel entrance as the crowd thinned. “Vaguely. I don’t remember her name, though.”

“Kilura. I asked her to look ahead so we could have some perspective from the air,” Jim reminded her. “She came back already.”

A lock of crumpled white hair fell across Claire’s face as she shook her head nervously, tucking it behind her ear with her free hand. “What...what did she see?” Claire asked, a note of uneasiness creeping into her voice.

“She said all the highways ahead are empty, and all the surrounding towns are evacuated. Like it’s all abandoned.” Jim held his arm still, willing himself not to tighten his grip to comfort her. The last of the trolls entered the mine, and he reflexively started after them toward the mouth of the tunnel, Claire following with her hand still in his.

“Weird, but maybe a good thing,” Claire said cautiously as they ambled toward the mine. “Less chance of anyone seeing us.” They both ignored the faded warning signs nailed into the decaying ore carts with long-rusted spindles of iron, letters leached of color by sun and rain.

“She also said that the trail of evacuated towns leads straight to Arcadia.”

“That’s not good.”

“No kidding.”

“So there’s another ominous coincidence. Why should we panic?” Claire countered hopefully, carefully stepping over a heap of rotting timber.

“Well,” Jim answered with resignation, “Kilura saw a single car headed our way, and she said another one had already arrived in Arcadia - even though all the roads are clear. I asked her to go look for that one.”

Claire sensed Jim’s hesitation, and real fear began to show on her face as she let go of his hand and placed a hand on the hilt of her knife. “Jim ... when was Kilura here?”

Jim finally sighed as her hand left his, but his breathing quickened as he realized what he wasn’t saying. “I asked her to come back within an hour. Claire, how long has it been since dusk?” His panicked eyes flicked down to her face, now turned to her watch as she took her first steps into the mine.

Claire inhaled sharply through her teeth, grimacing and turning to look up at Jim as he ducked underneath the overhang of wood bars at the entrance. “Jim, it’s four in the morning.”

“But that’s - that’s eight hours,” Jim said, stepping cautiously over the threshold. “Where is she?”

“Troll _..._ hunter _...RUN._ ”

At the sound of the urgent rasp, Jim and Claire whipped around. Jim just caught a glimpse of black-clad human figures, creeping from the forest like insects - and Kilura, draped with heavy chains, being dragged from the woods with black froth dripping from her open mouth like oil - before he automatically activated his shield and brought it to his unprotected face, his arm moving as if on its own. A heavy _thunk_ smashed into the shield a moment later, and Jim stumbled backwards, his legs too heavy to move as fast as he wanted. _Needed_. His ears flicked toward the sudden sound of branches snapping, and then a screech of pain from Kilura.

Jim lowered the shield warily, frantically gesturing behind his back for Claire to warn the rest of the trolls in the mine as he took in the scene against the backdrop of screams and cries from the last few straggling trolls behind him.

The humans were emerging from the woods, all wearing thick layers of padded black armor despite the warm summer evening and with tinted visors clamped over their faces. Behind him, Jim heard Claire hastily dashing further down the tunnel to ensure the last of the refugees were safe, and then the nervous shuffle of stone feet as the trolls hurried deeper into the tunnel. He suppressed a sigh of relief, instead eyeing the group of people.

There were fifteen or twenty of them, he guessed, spreading out enough to creep into his blind spots. All were aiming their weapons at him, approaching steadily, but at a slow pace. The shot he had narrowly blocked was a warning. He turned slowly, more to keep his balance than anything, summoning his glaives and holding them at the ready. He didn't want to spill human blood if at all possible, but he had also come too far to fail now.

A groan bubbled up from Kilura, and anxiety swelled in Jim’s heart. _Kilura!_ He spun back to face her, but was too late - one of the strange men was pressing the mouth of his weapon to Kilura’s neck. Kilura’s eyes were boiling with hatred, the tar still staining her teeth and streaming onto the ground. Her slitted pupils were fixed on the man’s visor, her lips drawn back in a vicious snarl, but the man’s face appeared to be pointed toward Jim, waiting for a reaction.

Jim growled, a guttural noise that crackled up from the depths of his throat as he raised his glaives and lowered his horns. The man seemed to be unfazed at the threat of death Jim had just offered in trollish terms, instead gesturing to the weapon he pointed at Kilura. Jim narrowed his eyes in confusion, trying to see better, but could only make out a striking resemblance to a long pole with a blunt end, instead of a gun as he’d initially thought. About half the men were carrying the same strange weapon, with the other half holding rifles as he’d initially thought. Then the man flicked a switch, and purple light scattered across the damp ground and sent a thin beam into Kilura’s shoulder.

The awful shriek of pain that resulted was unlike anything Jim had ever heard before, amplified tenfold by his newly augmented hearing. He shrank back instinctively, several of the men clamping their hands over their ears. The sickening sound of solid stone being seared into crumbling ash assailed the entire group, but the man holding the ultraviolet light maintained a firm, if shaking grip.

With desperation, Jim flung his glaives - too wide, too reckless - in a sloppy arc, and one just managed to strike the man’s side and sink into the joint of his protective clothing, the other sailing past him into the woods. With a scream, the man dropped to one knee, clutching the metal embedded in his side, unknowingly lowering himself to Kilura’s level.

In the next instant, his head disappeared between Kilura’s jaws. She had flung herself upon him the instant the light was lowered, tearing her chains free from the grip of the guards, and Jim watched with abject horror as she gripped the human’s head in her mouth in a clear threat, her fangs delicately framing the man’s visor but not biting down - not yet. The charred stone from her burn scraped to the ground from the motion, granite dust falling to the ground in sheets.

Jim found his voice, and screamed, “Kilura _, don’t!_ ”

Her wide eyes flicked to his, and for a single moment, Jim saw her gaze spark with the hope that they could somehow escape the situation - the hope that this man’s life would be valuable enough to his compatriots to be a worthy bargaining chip. The tension hung in the air for a mere moment, until the men around them simultaneously raised their weapons. Then the guns around them started firing, and Jim dropped to the ground just as he heard a distinctive, visceral _crunch_. The world spun, and Jim heaved himself from the ground and staggered as fast as he could toward a gap in the circle of men, trying to break free and help Kilura, get back to Claire, _anything._

He didn’t get very far before a pole swung into his line of sight, the dull glare of the unlit lightbulb glinting in the moonlight. Without breaking stride, Jim summoned his sword and slid the flat blade underneath the weapon, twisting up and away to break the man’s grip and send the pole whipping over their heads. The swing of the heavy blade yanked Jim’s arm to the right, and Jim was abruptly jerked along by its weight, crashing into another person. Before he could re-orient himself, a gloved fist slammed into Jim’s abdomen, just below the last plate of armor shielding his ribs. Pain lanced through Jim’s stomach, but the breath remained in his lungs. Jim snarled and smashed his head into the man’s helmet, the blunt weight of his horns yielding a sharp cracking noise. The man dropped to the ground, limp, and Jim moved over his body, struggling toward Kilura, disoriented by the mass of combatants moving in on him. He swung his sword with great effort to clear the way, both hands clutching at the handle as he cleaved the barrel of a rifle in two. The tip of his blade seemed to sink to the ground as he wielded it, his body moving as if through thick mud.

Somewhere, in the blurry recesses of Jim’s mind, strains of music began to filter into his perception and mixed with the sounds of battle, the instruments delivering unwanted melodies as he tried not to deliver fatal blows. He was still not sure what crimes the men were guilty of, despite the carnage he knew to lie just behind the crowd he was battling. Everything had happened so fast, he thought as he twisted his sword to smash the crook of a shoulder with the pommel. He was the Trollhunter, which meant he was the peacekeeper when it came to the affairs of trolls. But when humans dared to intrude into their secretive world, how far did his authority reach? He sliced the edge of a man’s arm, who screamed and dropped his flashlight to clutch at the injury, and the surge of blood caught his eye. That’s right - these enemies were composed not of stone and crystal, but familiar flesh and water. Jim, too, had been flesh once.

The violins grew louder, the symphony drowning out the wet thumps of wounded men falling to the muddy ground as Jim dealt rounded blows left and right. Was fighting back an overreach? Should he have retreated to the mine with Claire and defended the refugees of Trollmarket more directly? The men had not even offered demands - but then again, they were not the simple, naïve burglars he and Toby had found in the sewers so long ago. They had weapons designed to hurt trolls. That made this a simple extension of the ancient war for the surface lands - but if it stemmed from a place of misunderstanding, there was no time or diplomacy with which to reason with this small group. There was only confusion, and fear, and violence, and music.

The click of flashlights being switched on reached his ears from the jumble of noise, and Jim screamed in pain and frustration as the light caught his hand. He brought his sword to his front and spun it in an arc around him so that the men would leap back with yells of alarm, avoiding the massive blade that missed their bodies by inches. Taking advantage of the sudden space in front of him, Jim bounded forward toward the tree line, and regretted it a moment later when he landed and stumbled to the side, dizziness swooping through his stomach.

Lifting his head to look ahead at the unmoving form of Kilura, Jim tried to straighten, but was overcome by vertigo. A solid pressure welled in his head and pressed against the back of his eyes, and Jim groaned as he sunk to his knees. Having witnessed Jim’s sudden leap forward, the men hesitated behind him. The music quieted, but still thrummed relentlessly against the pounding in his head. Breathing in pants, Jim lifted a heavy arm and pulled a step forward. The grass felt cool and moist under his fingers, and angry tears gathered in his eyes as he crawled, ever so slowly, to where Kilura lay. He could hear the careful gathering of the men behind him, their steady approach obvious to troll senses, but he chose to ignore it, instead reaching out a hand to gently touch the edge of Kilura’s horn as he knelt beside her.

Her eyes were still open, staring blindly at the tree branches above them, glazed over with a thin film. The side of her body that was visible was pitted with bullet holes punched into her flank, cracks spiderwebbing across her stone skin. Her visible wing draped across the ground was shredded, tatters of membrane hanging from its spindly framework. Black fluid flowed freely from the wounds, glossing shiny and wet over the charred stone and powdery soot of her burns. He didn't know trolls could bleed. Real trolls, that was.

Jim stared at her face. Her mouth was still slightly open, fangs streaked with red and black, and bits of tissue were caught in the teeth. He refused to look to his left, where the man’s mangled body lay quite still. The music sighed, woodwinds humming a sad lament. Jim didn't understand why this had happened. The killing was supposed to stop after he defeated Gunmar. The war was supposed to be over. In his mind’s eye, he seemed to detach and hover slightly above himself, looking over his own shoulder even though he could still feel the plated armor of his shins digging into the wet ground. The sensation was abruptly foreign to him, perceived as if from a great distance.

Jim heard a shriek from far behind him, at the entrance to the mine. Claire. He began to turn, but the barrels of three flashlights suddenly dug into his neck. The ultraviolet lights. As good as the sun to a troll. Jim had used those, once, when he'd tried to trap Angor Rot in his bedroom and burn him to death. He'd almost succeeded. The thought now made him sick.

“Jim! Hold on!” Claire's frantic call came, and Jim felt a sinking feeling. _No, don't,_ he wanted to say. _They knew about trolls. They knew about us. Stay away._

The pop of a gun startled Jim, and rising into a crouch, he whipped around without a second thought, sword sliding cleanly through the back of the man who was still aiming his gun at an ore cart to the side of Claire as a warning. Jim’s blade cut into the lower abdomen, just to the left of the spine, as if slicing through warm butter. He was used to hacking at stone bodies, not the tender flesh of man. It was too easy. He heard Claire’s horrified gasp as if from far away, the crashing trumpets whipping themselves into an artful crescendo.

A burning pain suddenly seared into his neck, the excruciating heat biting into his skin. Blinded by the pain, Jim’s hands released the grip on the handle of his sword, and the men grabbed his wrists and twisted them behind his back, the weight of chains wrapping around his arms and legs, heavy and clinging. He gave in. His arms didn't feel like his own anyway. The man in front of him crashed to the ground, the sword embedded in his padded back dissipating into mist.

A heavy metal disc was slipped over Jim’s neck, the forked chains attached to it connected to small loops of belted leather. The loops were fastened to the flat edges of his horns and tightened to hold firm, forcing his shoulders to bow forward as he strained to support the weight. His horns were useless now, as long as they were forced to hold up the disc. The purple lights of the men’s ultraviolet flashlights danced around him in a beautiful warning, the orchestra swelling.

Another one of the humans stepped toward Claire as they were binding Jim, seemingly unfazed, as he opened his mouth to speak with a gruff voice. It was the first time one of the humans had said anything, Jim noted.

“Ma’am, please step back. This is none of your concern.”

“None of my concern, my _ass_! What are you doing with Jim?”

He shuddered and hunched over, trying to alleviate the weight bound to his horns. Someone from behind slipped a thick leather mask over the lower half of his face, binding tightly. A muzzle. They didn't want him to bite. Jim halfheartedly pulled against the chains, only to catch himself before he leaned too far and fell into the lights. He felt vaguely as if he were supposed to be resisting.

“Ma’am, stay back. I will fire one more warning shot, but I must advise that I am authorized to use lethal force if necessary.” The man cocked his gun, peering down the barrel at Claire's defiant form, just outside of the mine entrance. She was half-bent as if to attack, her long knife glinting in the moonlight, but her eyes kept flicking between Jim and the gun. Her violet armor was designed to repel a blade, not a bullet.

Jim watched her, faintly interested. None of this could be real. There was no reason for Kilura to die, no reason for these people to be here. No reason for his armored feet to slosh against the ground when he was ushered backwards, the blood and oil staining his armor as they dragged him past Kilura’s body and back into the tree line. The man was still speaking from the other end of a tunnel, Claire’s words sharp and furious, cutting through the air. Their voices faded away to yield to the swell of the orchestra, and then Jim could no longer see them, the remains of the group turning him to face away as they began to pick up a quick pace, pulling his chains taut in all directions.

Jim stumbled as they moved, quick and relatively soundless, back the way he had come with the remnants of Trollmarket. The men had left their fallen companions in front of the mine, Jim realized in a daze. The violins shrieked at the thought. They had forgotten Kilura, too. That was okay, though - she needed to be left out until daylight, anyway. Blinky had said that troll rites always began with turning the body of the deceased to stone. That was achieved through the application of natural daylight, if the troll had not already been petrified by its scalding heat. Only then could the body be reassembled and arranged, statue-like, for interment in a loved one’s home or specially designated crypt. So that was fine, really. They just needed to wait until daylight, and then they could go get Kilura.

The men yanked Jim down a hill, and he nearly tripped, held upright only by the balancing tug of chains at his back and sides. They were covering ground so fast, he noticed. It had taken weeks for the Trollmarket refugees to cover this much ground. Perhaps if all the trolls were suited for combat, and none were weighed down by assisting others or transporting their worldly possessions, the trolls would move this fast too. What a simple solution. They'd make it to New Jersey in a couple of months if that were the case, Jim thought with a touch of hysteria. The group was following a hiking trail now, heading down the one that led to the viewpoint at the top of the cliffs overlooking Arcadia - the same viewpoint where he'd danced with Claire so long ago. He hoped she was smart enough not to antagonize the man with the gun. He thought the man was serious, but Claire could take care of herself. She would protect Trollmarket until he got back. He'd only be gone until morning, after all, since he needed to take care of Kilura. Somewhere, in his head, the violas moaned and danced gracefully over a somber line.

Lost in thought, Jim barely paid attention to the rhythmic pace of slogging down the trail, only brought back to the present when they veered around the corner of a switchback and he had to pay attention to make the turn. Gradually, he became aware of a small, tinny voice that seemed to be screaming in fury, the battering music melting into a backdrop for the voice’s rage. He perked up, looking around for Claire, but saw only the silent guards and the dark forest. The screaming grew louder, and it dawned on Jim that none of the humans were reacting to the voice. Ah. So it was himself.

The noise condensed into words, then, drumming furiously at the base of Jim’s skull. _What are you doing? Turn around! Trollmarket is back there! Claire and Blinky are back there! You have to protect them! Why are you going with these men? What are you DOING?_

Jim flinched at the sudden shout, and was rewarded with the impatient tug of chains as the guards hurried him forward. I don’t know what to do, he thought hopelessly. Kilura is dead. They killed her. They knew where to track us down. They knew I wasn’t used to this body. How did they know?

 _It doesn’t matter_ , the voice insisted. _You should do what you have to do to escape! To protect the ones you care about! What was the point of defeating Gunmar? Was his defeat for nothing, if not to protect the ones you love?_

“No,” he mumbled aloud, the hot air stifling in the leather mask. “It wasn’t for nothing. I protected them.”

One of the men at his side gave him a quick glance, but said nothing.

They wanted me, he thought miserably. Just me. They could have attacked the other trolls, but they didn’t. No one got hurt but Kilura - and even then, they used her to get to me. That’s my fault. Better to go with them, give them what they want. It’s the best way to protect Trollmarket now.

He was met with silence. There was no response to that - it just made too much sense. He could always get away later, when there weren’t any more innocent bystanders that could get hurt. Couldn’t he?

The trees thinned, and Jim saw the trailhead approaching. The parking lot was deserted, except for a single black van. The four men holding Jim’s chains slowed down as the others rushed ahead, opening the back doors of the car and standing with their flashlights at the ready. One of them gestured impatiently, and Jim was hauled forward, stopping briefly at the edge of the van. He looked to the side, half hoping for a window of escape, but the bristling cluster of flashlights thrust into his face discouraged that notion. Jim took a deep breath and clambered in, awkward without the use of his hands. Someone shoved him to his knees with a clatter of armor, and the cab of the van quickly became crowded as the rest of the men piled in. One of them remained outside, slamming the door shut and pounding on it twice. Then the engine coughed and rumbled to life.

Jim began struggling again, trying to slip the bindings of the weight off of his horns, but one of the men smashed the barrel of a flashlight into his forehead at the impudence. The strike whited out the world for a few seconds and left Jim stunned. As his vision gradually returned, he groaned lowly at the stabbing headache that was beginning to spread from the base of his horns and seep into his skull. The music was back in full force, which certainly wasn’t helping.

Cracking one eye open, Jim nearly jumped at the blank visor that was only inches away from his face. The man nodded silently and lifted a gloved hand to point at the ceiling. Gingerly, Jim lifted his head to look, and saw strips of lights taped to the ceiling above him. The wires all trailed down one wall, a light switch affixed ominously next to the hastily assembled snarl of white disappearing into the wall. The man stood, and Jim tipped his head back further to see, cursing the sore pain that throbbed from the weight pulling against the movement. That pain was quickly smothered by fear as the man reached for the light switch, casually covering it with a thick hand so that Jim could not see whether he was about to flick it on. Every muscle in Jim’s body tensed at once, the flutes humming in suspense, and for a few moments, the only real sounds in the van were the purr of the engine and the quick, rough breathing of Jim beginning to panic. The man remained in his position until he seemed satisfied with Jim’s reaction, and gradually lowered his hand. The implication was clear - if Jim tried to cause trouble, there were more than enough warm bodies crammed into the van to turn on the ultraviolet lights and burn Jim into stone before he would be able to dispatch enough men to escape.

Jim flinched, hunching over into a tight ball and staring resolutely at the floor of the van. The threat had been made and well understood. There was nothing, well and truly _nothing_ that he could do. The low roar of the car engine shook the floor under him, the blacked-out windows offering little clues as to where Jim and his captors were headed. All he needed was a window of opportunity - just one - and he could break free. Just one chance. Jim closed his eyes, breathing deeply. He needed to be patient, and strike when the time was right.

-

As the black van began to speed down the empty highway, a cello plucked at its strings. Then the van was thrown into stark relief by a bright flare of light far ahead of it, unexpectedly stunning the driver for a split second, and the motion of the van faltered.

In the next moment, the car suddenly jerked and swerved over the dashed line, muffled yells and the sounds of struggle splitting the veneer of the tranquil night. Within seconds, the tinted windows suddenly lit up with brilliant purple, an agonized scream slicing through the raucous noise. Silence fell, and the light lingered briefly before shutting off. The shadows around the van swooped in to fill the gaps in the darkness, once again wrapping the van in anonymity as it recovered its steady course.

A few minutes passed, and a human figure came into view, white coat almost glowing in the headlights. The man was standing on the side of the road next to a crumpled wreck of a vehicle, silhouetted against a faint blue glow, and he waved a hopeful arm at the van as it approached. The van did not care. It smoothly barrelled past him, hastening along its route.

The man soon disappeared in the rearview mirror, and the van was swallowed again by the vacuum of isolation, headlights peering into the stirring dawn of the horizon. The symphony hovered on one last flourishing note, the movement finally coming to a quiet conclusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The orchestral piece I always imagined playing during this scene was Symphony No. 7 in A Major, Op. 92: II Allegretto by Beethoven, though I did take some liberties with describing the instruments. If you liked the speculative biology, fantastic! That's what I'm all about :P
> 
> The watercolor illustration for this chapter can be found [here](https://taggerbug.tumblr.com/post/625636894661836800/light-in-a-major-illustration-for-chapter-4-of-my). 
> 
> Next chapter will update on Tuesday 8/11.
> 
> This is my first fic, please leave a kudos/comment if you liked it!


	5. Stranger in a Foreign Land

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obligatory disclaimer, once again, that this story is going to get very dark. If you are easily put off or upset by serious occurrences or situations, I strongly recommend you message me on tumblr (@taggerbug) with any questions before reading.
> 
> No chapter illustration yet, as I wanted to do some fanart for Wizards instead! It'll be posted on my tumblr later this week if you'd like to take a look.
> 
> Chapter title is from Legs Away by Mother Mother because I couldn't help myself. It's a beautiful and very fitting song.

When Krel opened his eyes, he wasn’t sure how he was still alive. His core felt raw, scoured from the inside, and he could still taste aluminum on his tongue. His limbs felt like lead, oddly weighed down where they should have been light. He lay still for a moment, silently adjusting to the shock of his continued existence. His memory was fuzzy, but he distinctly recalled making a couple of very foolish decisions, neither of which had granted his freedom, and had probably risked more than they were worth.

Fluorescent lights glared down at him from above, and the floor felt smooth and cold beneath him. Krel held his breath, waiting for the bump and jostle of the car, but the room remained perfectly still. So. He had arrived. He exhaled, dry air rushing from his mouth.

Where was he? Krel was almost afraid of the answer. He turned his head, and saw a glass wall extending from floor to ceiling, eerily reminiscent of his brief imprisonments in Area 49b. He sat up suddenly, alarm surging in his core, noting in the back of his mind that his arms and legs were no longer restrained. He looked around frantically, only to confirm his worst suspicions - he was in a large glass enclosure, about the size of his small bedroom at home, that was set against a wall. The floor was featureless and white, the only furniture being a solid white block stretching along the side to his right, around the height of a table, with a thin metal handrail attached near the top. Outside of the cage, the room was occupied by a small desk with a computer monitor and a cup of pencils. A small cart was pushed against a wall, a thick-lipped tray resting on top.

Was he in Area 49-B? He narrowed his eyes. No, if this were Area 49-B, there wouldn’t be a need for all the cloak-and-dagger. They were sanctioned by the government. Colonel Kubritz had tried to capture him and Aja from a public school in the middle of the day - they weren’t subtle. Whatever this place was, they _really_ didn’t want people knowing about them. Then Krel noticed something: a white mug of coffee, resting on the desk, with its handle at an angle. Wisps of steam curled from the beverage. Still hot.

Krel struggled to his feet, swearing at himself when none of his limbs seemed to cooperate properly. His arms hung limp, the feeling in them dulled, and his legs felt uncertain, as if he were newly formed. He backed up in panic, until his back hit the wall. His blue glow sputtered and flared with fear, and just then, the door opened. It was a human woman, wearing a white coat and whiter smile, grin stretching across her face as she caught sight of Krel, stooped against the far edge of his enclosure like a wild animal.

“Oh, good! You’re awake!” she chirped, kicking the door shut behind her as she dumped her armful of manila folders on the desk. “We have _so_ much to do!” She approached the glass, and Krel tried to resist the urge to cross his topmost arms over his core. She peered at him, eyes roving over his body with excitement. Krel tried to imagine what he must look like through the eyes of such a different species: His arms and legs were longer than a human’s, second pair of arms set against the lower half of where a ribcage might be. His upper pair were anchored higher than the human’s, the curves of his neck and chest sloping gracefully to accommodate the extra limbs. He was significantly larger than humans in mass, he'd noticed, towering over his human friends with their sickly thin arms and stunted heights. He'd assumed they were all lacking in some nutrient, or some other component required to nourish their fleshy bodies. But after attending their human school and observing the same pattern in the rest of the students, it could only be concluded that humans were just smaller as a species. Krel had grown used to hunching over and curling his shoulders in to reduce his height when he socialized with his friends, a conscious effort to reduce the shock he imagined they felt whenever they looked at him. The blue bioluminescence and black eyes were different enough as it was.

He examined her in turn, noting the dark hair pulled back tightly, the makeup smeared under her eyes, the wrinkled blouse. He wondered what time it was. Despite the slightly rumpled appearance, her posture was confident and her attire professional. Her face was slightly lined with the markers of age, her expression kind but firm. She knew what she was doing.

“We’re going to have a lot of fun,” she mumbled to herself, retreating to her desk, where she took a long, pensive sip of coffee. “But first --!” She straightened up, and unexpectedly inclined her head in a short bow to Krel. How did she know he was royalty?, he thought with rising concern. Had his identity somehow already found its way into the hands of these people? His thoughts were dashed, however, by her next remark.

“Thank you,” she said solemnly, “for your sacrifice for the advances of science. Humanity will forever be in your debt.”

“Wait, hold on,” Krel stammered anxiously, “What do you mean by ‘sacrifice’?”

“Ooh, they didn’t tell me you could talk,” she said delightedly, but Krel saw her brows furrow as she tried to hide a frown. “I guess that’ll make my job easier.” She picked up a clipboard from her desk, and dragged the chair over to the glass with an earsplitting scrape. Settling herself in it, she clicked a pen and looked at Krel expectantly. “First question: what do you consume for energy?”

“Excuse me?” Krel’s mind was spinning, not only from the memory of Area 49-B, but by the unexpected painlessness of her interview. “What do you mean by my sacrifice? I didn’t choose to do any such thing.”

“Does an ant choose to be eaten by a spider? It’s just unfortunate coincidence, but all the better for the spider. Everything needs energy. To carry out metabolic processes, what do you eat?” the woman repeated patiently, as if speaking to a child. Krel stared at her in confusion.

“Um, nothing? I mean, I could eat, but then I’d have to tell my body to break down the food, and it takes more energy than it’s worth. Why am I telling you this?”

“I just wanted to confirm,’ she said absentmindedly, scribbling on her keyboard. “The boys in the theoretical department think you run on some sort of nuclear fission. Is that true?”

Krel scowled, not only at the invasiveness of her question, but at the presumption that Akiridions were primitive enough to use fission. “Why should I tell you?” he demanded.

The lady’s smile faded, and she stood up slowly, placing her clipboard on the chair as she did so. She placed her hands on her hips, and met Krel’s gaze calmly. “A few ground rules, then. My name is Doctor Grey. You should address me as such. I am the scientist in charge of data collection for this experiment, of which you are the subject. I’d like to avoid causing physical damage for as long as possible, but to do that, you need to answer my questions.”

“Why did you take me from my home in the middle of the night? What is this place?” Krel demanded, his lower pair of hands clenching into fists. He refused to show fear in front of this woman, even though he had never been so terrified in his life. This organization had, so far, showed little of the incompetence that had been rampant in Area 49-B. It would surely be much more difficult to escape this time.

Dr. Grey sighed and walked to a panel on the wall that Krel had thought was a fuse box. She rummaged in the pockets of her lab coat for a moment before fishing out a key and unlocking the panel door, revealing an array of buttons and a small display screen. Krel squinted, trying to ascertain the function of the panel, but Dr. Grey was obscuring it from view as she tapped buttons in a practiced sequence. “Perhaps you do not understand,” she said clearly. “I am the one asking questions, not you. You are a machine - a drone for your species. I took the liberty of running a few scans when Mr. Dauberon brought you here, and do you know what I found?”

Krel swallowed, suddenly realizing the scope of this disaster. Dr. Grey continued, “You have no heart. No brain. Just an artificial computer, carrying out the demands of your species.”

“It’s not like that,” Krel started, then bit his tongue. Dr. Grey looked over and gave him a sympathetic smile.

“How would you know?” she asked simply. Before Krel could react, she pressed one final button, and suddenly everything stopped.

It felt as though his core had collapsed into a black hole, a hole in the center of everything, and the entire universe was collapsing around him, atoms stripped of meaning and flung through the limits of physics by an uncaring god. Gaylen had grown tired of crushing stars and forming planets, and He was beginning to tear the fabric of reality apart - but there was no Vanquisher to stop Him this time, there was only the Scourge and His strength to remake the universe as He saw fit. Krel distantly perceived the moment he dropped to his hands and knees, falling slowly as if sinking through quicksand, as sparks burst at the edges of his vision and rained to the ground. His glow choked and died, the solid outlines of his arms in front of him blurring as the sensation of solid ground dissipated along with his eyesight. His processors whined faintly. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t breathe. He was dying, well and truly dying.

Just as quickly as it had come, the sensation left. Krel gasped for air, trembling fingers reaching up to touch his head gently, to reassure himself that his body was still solid. His hands moved over his face and chest, his glow brightening slightly. As if from the end of a tunnel, Dr. Grey’s words slowly filtered into his processors.

“- understand now?” Krel raised his head to see her, eyes wide in horror. She looked at him, in the dark room, one hand casually resting on the control panel.

“What did you -” he cut himself off with a gurgle as Dr. Grey’s eyebrow twitched and she moved as if to press the button again. He held himself, willing every shaking limb to remain still, and after what seemed like an eternity, she took her hand off the panel. Krel nearly collapsed in relief, and Dr. Grey murmured in approval as she checked the display.

“Two hundred and sixty-seven megawatts for one minute?” Her eyes widened, and she turned to stare at Krel, who had nearly collapsed on the ground. Her lips moved silently, her eyes far away as she appeared to be mentally calculating. “That’s...no, that’s sixteen thousand per hour...at capacity...that means...by God.” Dr. Grey stepped away from the panel, as if in a daze, and stood in front of Krel, separated by the glass. He tiredly met her wide eyes with his own, searching her face and finding only excitement. “That’s _four times_ the maximum capacity of the _largest nuclear reactor_ in this country.” She rocked back on her heels, shaking her head in amazement. “You run on fusion, don’t you?”

Krel set his mouth in a grim line, refusing to give her the satisfaction of knowing that she was right. Dr. Grey frowned with disappointment, and moved as if to make for the panel again. Krel’s core spasmed violently at the thought, and he exclaimed with sudden desperation, “Yes! You’re right. It’s nuclear fusion. There’s a reactor built into our cores.” He waited with bated breath as she paused, then relaxed.

Dr. Grey’s mouth curled into a satisfied smile. “That’s more like it. As a favor, I’ll let you know something in return.” She gestured offhandedly to the panel as she locked its door, dropping the key back into a pocket and sitting comfortably in her chair in front of Krel. “That just now was an experimental design. We knew you ran on some kind of power, we just didn’t know what. So we prepared this containment facility just for you - when unshielded, the thermoelectric crystals set into the floor and ceiling allow me to siphon the energy from your power source, and redirect it to our facilities.” Krel’s terror mounted as she continued talking. “I’m sure it can’t feel too pleasant, but management is always looking for ways to reduce our electricity bill, and - well. If that little demonstration hadn't just destroyed our overflow batteries, as I'm sure it did, it would have collected enough juice to keep our entire campus running off-grid for the next three hundred thousand years. Perhaps once we’re done with you, we could sell the excess.”

Siphon his core’s energy reserves to power a building? He’d been used as a sentient _battery_? It was as barbaric a thought as if Krel had hooked up the mothership to a living human being, and allowed the person’s blood to sit stagnant in its arteries while the frantic pulse of their heart was used to circulate coolant. He couldn’t begin to count the number of intergalactic rights treaties that Dr. Grey had just violated. Krel’s mouth fell open in shock, and without thinking, he exclaimed, “Do you know what you’ve _done_?”

Dr. Grey’s smile faltered, but held firm. “Of course,” she said lightly. “I’ve harvested the energy from a robotic drone for sixty seconds. It didn’t destroy it, but it did appear to cause some physical distress, so I can assume that if I do that too much, the drone’s power source will be drained. As long as the drone graciously gives me the answers I want, I won’t need to risk that. Everyone’s happy - the drone gets to hold on to its fuel, I get to advance human civilization by millions of years.”

Krel shook his head in disbelief as Dr. Grey glanced down at her clipboard again. “Now, I assume that you are programmed to adapt to the communicative needs of your environment? Hence your perfect English?”

“I...” He hesitated, but Dr. Grey glanced meaningfully at the panel, and fear stabbed through Krel’s core like ice and became lodged there. “...yes, I’m programmed to learn how to communicate with native fauna.” The words tasted acidic on his tongue; Akiridions were no more “programmed” than humans. The only difference between their minds was that humans’ were stored in fleshy cells and living tissue, whereas Akiridions’ were stored in vast memory banks. If humans were just a few million years more advanced, they might have done it themselves.

Admittedly, the compatibility with computerized data was advantageous - Krel did, in fact, have the ability to absorb languages and regurgitate them with admirable fluency, given enough time to adapt. But to suggest that he was a mere computer program? No, he was still a living being, despite whatever his core was made of, with all the agency and self-awareness that entailed. He had the ability to make mistakes, and learn from them. He could still love, and hate, and laugh, and cry. He certainly felt like crying now.

“Well, that leads us to our most interesting question,” Dr. Grey continued mildly. She set the clipboard down on her lap and leaned forward, looking at Krel intently. “What are you doing on Earth?”

Krel’s breath caught in his throat, at a loss for words. The urge to weep was swelling ever stronger, and he beat it back ferociously, forcing himself to compartmentalize his emotions and analyze the situation. This woman was under the impression that he was a mechanical foot soldier of some sort, and despite his initial protests, he realized he had no inclination to let her believe otherwise - he doubted she’d believe his pleas of sentience, and he was especially keen to conceal his native political status. There was no telling what this savage organization would do with such information. He would have to play his cards carefully, and try to do something once the threat of the energy siphon was no longer an issue. He took a deep breath, and met Dr. Grey’s attentive gaze.

“I was...sent here alone,” he began, thinking quickly. “The planet I come from has great interest in exploring this galaxy. I am a...scout, stationed here to collect information about Earth. Its inhabitants, natural resources, native species, things like that. In another forty years, I will have collected enough information, and will return to my planet to pass along the information.”

“Forty years? Such a long time,” Dr. Grey said softly. “Why spend so much time here?”

“Er...I have to be thorough,” Krel lied. “Collecting enough data takes a while, because we’re searching for...rare minerals. Iridium, painite, and muride, for example. But I also have to assess the organic life on each planet, because my people won’t harvest anything from a populated planet if it could cause harm to the native inhabitants.”

Dr. Grey mouthed the word _muride_ , a faraway look in her eyes. “Well,” she smiled, “you can thank me for saving you from a lifetime of scanning the Earth’s crust. Now, you have the chance to compensate for Alexandria.”

“What are you talking about? The Library of Alexandria didn't have anything to do with me!”

“No, it was the folly of man. And now,” Dr. Grey stood, a slightly manic look settling over her face, “the wisdom of man will correct it. Whatever I learn from studying you will advance countless scientific fields, far ahead of whenever we naturally would have done so. The Summer of Earth will commence - a golden age of art, philosophy, and culture. I think the sacrifice of a single alien drone is more than a fair price for _that_.”

With that, she gathered up her papers and coffee mug, casting one last excited glance at Krel as she hurried through the door, heaving back on the handle with a crunch of mechanisms - more mechanical locks, Krel noted with despair.

“I’ll be back!” she declared, her voice slipping around the corner of the door as it crashed shut behind her with the finality of reinforced steel.

Krel lowered himself hesitantly to the ground, hardly daring to believe his poor luck. He was stuck in some nightmarish form of Area 49-B, one where the security was competent and the scientists ambitious. Not only did they know where he lived, but they had abducted him so neatly - so _professionally_ \- that Krel could not delude himself into thinking he was the only wretched soul being held here. This undoubtedly encompassed far more than himself.

And yet, once again, he was powerless to do anything. Krel drew his knees up to his chest, wrapping his four arms around his legs as he stared blankly at the ground. At least when the usurper General Morando had tried to claim the strength of the gods, Krel had been free. Free to defend his friends, or to flee and save himself - but free to make that choice. His agency had been stolen from him.

The floor glinted, the facets of the thermoelectric crystals taunting him from underneath the thin veneer of their protective shield. If Krel looked up, he knew he would see the same awful sight on the ceiling. He was confined in a chamber designed to divert the energy that his core produced in order to sustain himself - a knife held to his jugular, ready to slice the blood from his throat at any moment according to the whims of Dr. Grey. He dropped his head into his hands and sighed.

Logically, there was little hope of rescue from the outside. Krel doubted that Aja would notice anything amiss from a few delsons of his failure to contact her; in fact, she could be so busy with extinguishing political and social fires on Akiridion-5 that she wouldn’t think anything amiss for wardons. Even then, she couldn’t possibly leave the planet, tenuous as the situation was - perhaps an emissary or two would be sent to investigate his absence, but they would undoubtedly find nothing. Missing Akiridions were usually quite easy to track, given the atomic maelstrom of nuclear energy that their cores contained - like a flaming beacon to the right scanner - and the interconnectedness with their artificial surroundings that all Akiridions experienced on their planet. But on Earth? There were no structural networks for Krel’s core to latch on to, no thrumming lines of interpersonal communication and interaction that the infrastructure of Akiridion-5 was designed to facilitate. Furthermore, in a place as thorough in their capture and containment as this one, there was surely boron and concrete lining the walls and blocking any trace of neutron radiation. Even the helium that Krel’s core produced as waste would barely be detectable, seeing as it would simply filter out through the vents and float into the atmosphere. No, if he were to have any hope of being discovered by someone helpful, there would have to be an Akiridion in the building itself, close enough to notice the faint shimmer of sentience from his core.

So not even his new friends could help. Krel started at the realization; he had been trying not to recognize the fact that they would be as ineffectual as he was. Tonight was a Friday, the beginning of the “weekend” - clever timing on the part of the laboratory - so even if he did not show up to Steve’s movie night on Saturday, his friends would simply assume that he had chosen to stay home instead. They might even think he was “out sick” when he inevitably failed to reveal himself at school the following Monday.

Krel released a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding, and tipped his head back to hit the wall with a dull sound. Eli had once caught an illness called pneumonia, early at the beginning of the school year, and he had not been able to leave his home for wardons. Krel had been so afraid that Eli’s fragile body of flesh would be unable to survive the horrific sickness, but Toby and Steve had assured him that Eli had received medicine and would eventually recover. Krel had had doubts. At least Krel and the others had visited Eli - bringing him homework, attempting to cook soup, trying to cheer him up and distract him from the violent coughing that rattled his lungs.

That was it - they had _checked in_ on Eli. They hadn't just assumed that he was fine at home. A small smile formed on Krel’s face at the memory. Yes, he decided, his absence would be noticed. Perhaps one of his friends would note the strangeness of his disappearance. It would surely be only a matter of delsons before they devised some way to find him. All Krel had to do was wait, and survive.

When the door creaked open a few mekrons later, Krel met the emerging figures with new resolve in his eyes. He rose to his feet, feeling much better. Dr. Grey entered first, with a single notebook and fresh cup of coffee, followed by a tall man loaded with manila folders and small metal and plastic devices. Krel felt oddly as if he had seen him before.

Krel’s memory banks suddenly made the connection, presenting a blurry image of this man buckling Krel into the front seat of a black van. The van that he had just before tried to destroy - the van that had taken him from his home. Krel’s mouth fell open in shock, and he spoke without thinking. “You!”

The man jumped, badly, and nearly lost his grip on his armful of papers, looking at Krel like he had suddenly noticed a tiger in the room. He looked considerably less disheveled now - his hair was combed, the graphic tee replaced by a collared shirt. Bandages were wrapped around his neck and both forearms, the white gauze peeking from the sleeves of the man’s own lab coat. Yet for all the accoutrements of professionalism, the man still seemed scattered. He adjusted his stack of paper and objects, setting them down hastily on Dr. Grey’s desk.

“Me,” the man mumbled. Dr. Grey gave him a disapproving look, then turned back to Krel with false cheer.

“Do you recognize this person?” She asked kindly, one hand already reaching for a pen in her pocket and clicking it as she flipped her notebook open on her desk.

Krel frowned. “He took me here. In the car.”

“Yes, the car! I must thank you for that,” Dr. Grey said brightly. “When Oliver, here, pulled into the parking lot with the van in that state, it helped clue us in to how unstable your power source can be. We already had your room prepared, of course, but we had to make some modifications before you - ah - woke up.”

Something about her words bothered Krel, but he couldn’t quite place it. His recollections of the van were fuzzy and ill-defined, and he couldn’t quite remember what had happened after he had tried to access his energy banks, save for that moment of clarity when he had fought through his exhaustion to see the man reaching across him to fasten the seatbelt.

“Did I hurt anyone?” he thought to ask, with a hint of trepidation. The man behind Dr. Grey tensed, but her smile remained.

“Well, Oliver got a bit of a nasty burn, but that’s all. You won’t have to see him after today, don’t worry - I just needed some help carrying these monitors in here for today’s projects.”

That didn’t sound good at all. Krel licked his lips. “Projects?”

“Nothing to worry about. We don’t even have to open your room for a while,” Dr. Grey reassured him, Oliver working to set up the various articles he’d brought in the background. Krel tried to subtly crane his neck to get a better glimpse, but was distracted by Dr. Grey pulling a familiar key from her pocket.

“No. No, no, no,” Krel said with alarm, “I’ve been cooperating! I’m cooperating right now, see?”

Dr. Grey appeared to ignore him as she unlocked the panel door on the wall, taking a long moment to examine the controls before she gave him an indulgent glance. “Not to worry,” she said, “I can do more than just activate the siphon. I’m just going to try a few of those preliminary projects - you shouldn’t suffer.”

Considering that she was under the misguided impression that the extent of Krel’s perceptions were limited to the pain of redirected energy, her words held little comfort.

“Policy dictates that she tests your reactions to different environmental conditions before doing anything invasive,” Oliver added. Dr. Grey gave him a nasty look, and he flushed with embarrassment before silently returning to his work. Krel’s core warmed at the thought, the knowledge that he was physically protected for at least a little while comforting.

He shifted nervously as Dr. Grey tapped at buttons unseen behind the panel door, instead keeping a wary eye on Oliver in the background. Curious, that Dr. Grey saw fit to introduce herself with a more formal title, but her colleague was addressed as one might refer to a friend or child. Given Dr. Grey’s dismissal of Oliver, as well as his appearance and what Krel knew of human development, he supposed neither of those possibilities were accurate. Dr. Grey was deliberately portraying this Oliver as beneath her. He did not hold the same power. As Krel watched him, Oliver seemed to grow more and more distressed, at one point fumbling a pencil and dropping it on the paneled floor. As he stooped to pick it up, his eyes flicked to Krel’s, and he seemed to freeze. Krel merely watched him, and after a beat, Oliver mouthed what might have been a soundless apology before hurriedly straightening up and returning to his work arranging primitive contraptions over the desk.

Krel’s nose wrinkled as he cast his gaze over the devices - iron, or tin, by the looks of them, designed to produce sound frequencies or measure air pressure and the like. Ancient dials and knobs littered their surfaces, and all appeared to be battery-powered at first glance, though he spied one that was attached to the wall by an extension cord. He was baffled by the inelegance of it all, and again cursed his misfortune to be captured for study by a civilization that hadn't even ventured beyond its own useless satellite moon. Being trapped by the Seryeznost or even the Poshibok would be much more interesting; perhaps he could have at least enjoyed company with the intelligence and sophistication of a more interstellar species, without the humans’ wild misunderstandings and crude tools. It was nothing less than embarrassing that Krel’s unwillingness to live in the present time had resulted in exposure to all the worst parts of the past. He had chosen this prehistoric civilization precisely for its simple comfort, and now he was paying the price of facing all the ignorance that entailed.

“So, tell me about your planet,” Dr. Grey said, drawing Krel’s attention. She was looking at him now, leaning slightly against the wall just behind the panel with a pen held loosely at her side. She seemed more relaxed, and Krel thought over his response, wary of the question.

“Well, I didn't see much before I was sent out here,” Krel lied. “It is very far away - almost too far to travel in a practical amount of time. I mostly saw the industrial district I occupied prior to deployment, which looked very different from a city here.”

“Different how?” Dr. Grey prompted. Krel tried to think of a convincing enough description, but his core felt fuzzy and unfocused for some reason. Oh well. What was the harm in this inconsequential piece of information? It wasn't as if the basic structure and geology of his planet would give the laboratory any more of an advantage over him.

Krel sighed, feeling very tired. “The buildings are taller there - much taller, and built in thinner shapes. We don't have to worry so much about climate and natural disasters - most inhabited areas of the planet are completely structurally enclosed for the protection of citizens.”

“What do you need the protection for?”

“It's more of an atmospheric sensibility. My people prefer to have a comfortable environment to return to when they return from exploring another planet. Because the many lands of the galaxies are so varied, it is seen as luxurious to have a stable, predictable area of permanent residence. This is seen as a significant marker of prosperity by our society.”

“So who gets to partake in these protected cities? The privileged, or the highly esteemed?” Dr. Grey seemed more invested now, looking keenly through the glass. Krel wanted so badly to laugh at her, to call her society barbaric and stunted for the assumption.

“No,” he finally answered, “All of my species live in cities like that, unless they choose not to. My planet has beautiful landscapes, and some enjoy the more rustic setting of living outside the enclosed cities - but only a few.”

“And what do the landscapes look like?”

Krel’s unfocused gaze drifted to the ceiling as he recalled fond memories of exploring the countryside with his family, on the rare escape from royal duty. “It is unlike anything here. The rusty cliffs cover the land in towering mountains and deep canyons, through which flow streams of glittering mercury. Boiling lakes of magma and liquid water under the crust house most of our wildlife species, which are predominantly silicon-based. There are places where these cauldrons of bubbling water breach the surface, and it is a wonderful sight to watch the _prostyn_ leap from the water. If the weather conditions are right, it is pleasant to swim with them.”

Dr. Grey was scribbling furiously now, not even looking up as she asked, “What are _prostyn_?”

Krel blinked, barely recognizing the word being mangled horribly by fleshy vocal cords. “ _Prostyn_ ,” he said clearly, the articulating speakers in his core repeating the word with crystal definition, “are aquatic animals that dwell in the underground rivers. I suppose there is no equivalent word in English. They resemble the snakes of this world, though much larger and with different faces, and they catch smaller creatures to eat by using a three-fingered hand at the end of their tail.”

“Yes, yes,” Dr. Grey said distractedly, flipping to the next page, “and you say you swam with them? In the boiling lakes?”

“Ah ... drones are built to withstand extreme environments, so as to better canvass the different environments of the galaxies. The ... the _real_ members of my species could not tolerate such an activity.”

Dr. Grey looked up sharply, a glint in her eye. Krel nearly flinched, but forced himself to remain still and relaxed. “You refer to yourself as belonging to the same species as your creators, despite being a robot. Why is that?”

The word _robot_ rattled uncomfortably against Krel's core. He was not unfamiliar with the term, but it was generally regarded in the more civilized circles of interstellar species as a crass insult to Akiridions. It was usually directed by someone who hadn't yet met one, but had heard legends of their unending search for knowledge, traversing the furthest ends of every galaxy for the scientific and artistic development of their people. To Krel, now, the word made him think of the blank robots in his home, soulless eyes seeing but not perceiving, their simple processors understanding but not learning. Inside them, unseen, was a soupy mess of coding, augmented by Krel’s learned but casual hand, rearranging their behaviors as easily as one might dissect a frog.

“On my home planet ... we are all equal,” Krel said softly. He thought of the blank robots, built to shift the burden of menial tasks away from Akiridion citizens and give them the gift of time with which to develop and learn. He thought of his own family, revered by their people, looked up to as glittering examples of wisdom and leadership bestowed by a divine touch. “Robots contribute to the cause of society, so we are seen as honorary members of society. A short life, one that is largely spent in unknown territory to collect information for the good of the species, is honored.”

“So a robot running on nuclear fusion has a short lifespan?” Dr. Grey asked, her words careful. “What does a full lifespan usually entail?”

 _Hundreds of keltons,_ Krel wanted to say. _Perhaps even thousands, as a son of Seklos, if you weren’t draining the life-blood from my body._ “I am not sure,” he said simply. “My function is not to know about the living members of my people, but rather to collect information about a foreign land and relay it. A singular purpose.”

Dr. Grey settled back, seeming slightly disappointed, but something about the continued attentiveness in her eyes made Krel self-conscious. Something had changed. A blip in his core readings drew his attention, and he absorbed the information without looking away. An unusual environmental temperature had been noted. Krel slowly inhaled, warmed the air in his projection near his hot core, and released it in a plume of fog. “Since when,” he deadpanned, “is a normal laboratory held at negative two hundred degrees Fahrenheit?”

Dr. Grey smiled widely. “Since I began testing your environmental limitations,” she answered. “You can measure external temperatures?”

“Among other things,” Krel muttered. He hadn't expected her to unearth that information so crudely. At the very least, he’d expected them to use dry ice or molten steel to test his capabilities, not an advanced air-conditioning unit.

“Well, we just have to wait a while to see the results of short-term exposure,” Dr. Grey continued. “But it is interesting that you only realized the change in temperature once it had reached its limit.”

“I wasn’t exactly paying attention,” Krel defended.

“So you need to ‘pay attention’ to access your own measuring equipment?” Dr. Grey made a note on her paper, and Krel bit back his words in frustration. No matter what lies he fed her, it all drew back to elements of truth. He had to be more careful. Dr. Grey said nothing more, merely writing a more lengthy entry in her notebook. Krel glared past her at Oliver, now fidgeting by Dr. Grey’s computer with nothing to do. His glasses had a crack in one of the lenses, and he was scratching at one of the bandages at his wrist. A pang of concern stabbed through Krel.

“Oliver,” Krel called softly, “Are you okay?”

Oliver looked up sharply, Dr. Grey’s eyes flicking up from her notebook. Krel ignored her.

“I - I’m fine,” Oliver stammered, seemingly taken aback by Krel’s question. Yet there was a hesitance there, a burning question he did not ask - wasn’t _allowed_ to ask.

Pools of guilt and shame seeped into Krel’s core and remained there, heavy and dripping. If Krel’s foolish attempt to weaponize his core energy without the proper channeling function of a serrator had harmed this human, that was Krel’s responsibility. He didn’t quite know the effect such an action would have on a carbon-based life form, but he knew enough of xenobiology to guess. Krel looked at Dr. Grey out of the corner of his eye.

“There is no immediate harm, as long as you treat the burns,” he said finally. Oliver sagged in visible relief, but his eyes darted to Krel once more as he spoke again. “That being said ... you should have a medical doctor check your cells for unusual activity when you are older.” The words were difficult to get out, the regret unspoken.

“Unusual activity? You mean like cancer?” If Oliver hadn't looked worried before, he did now.

“Risks of the career, Oliver,” Dr. Grey said absentmindedly. “You’ll be provided the best of healthcare, of course.”

A thick, awkward silence fell. Krel avoided meeting Oliver’s eyes, and instead watched Dr. Grey make a note in her papers.

“Now then,” she continued, “shall we continue?” She tapped the panel, frowning in mild frustration at some unseen reading. “Of course, we have to wait for your room to return to a more stable temperature before going so far in the other direction.” Dr. Grey glanced back at her desk, seeming to notice Oliver as if he had not been standing there the entire time. “You’re still here?” she asked bemusedly.

Oliver flinched at the words, scratching at his wrist. “I thought - I thought you needed help?” he questioned timidly. His gaze slid to Krel, eyes filled more with curiosity than worry now.

Dr. Grey sighed deeply. “Don't you have your own experiment to attend to? I'm sure it's recovered by now.”

“Oh - you’re right, of course. I’ll see you later, then.”

“Perhaps,” Dr. Grey muttered. Oliver scrambled to gather his things, giving Krel a hasty nod of acknowledgement before he heaved back on the door handle and slipped out of the room.

Krel watched him go with mixed feelings. Oliver was responsible for his own imprisonment and helplessness, but in return Krel had placed a very near limit on the human’s lifespan, quite by accident. Was Krel justified in his actions by attempting to defend himself? Or was it his responsibility, as a representative of a more advanced and cultured species, to avoid doing harm to the rightful inhabitants of this planet he was occupying as a guest?

His thoughts were cut short by Dr. Grey suddenly moving, carelessly slamming the panel shut and approaching the glass face of his cage. Her eyes were alight with excitement, but her arm was steady as she pointed at the platform to one side of the enclosure.

“Little drone,” she commanded in a businesslike tone, “lie down and remain still.”

Krel opened his mouth to protest, only to falter as Dr. Grey raised an eyebrow coldly. Of course - the threat of the energy siphon negated any dispute Krel might have. The address stung, regardless. He looked at the table dubiously, but sat down, and after a moment of hesitation, swung his legs onto the smooth surface and settled back, carefully resting his head. If he tucked his chin and looked far enough down and to the left, he could see Dr. Grey, who was already hurrying back to the panel.

“Little drone,” she said again, Krel scowling at the remark, “I am going to raise the walls of your room. Keep your arms at your sides, and do not move.”

Krel nervously flattened all four palms to the table. He heard a click and whirr come from the panel, and then the rasp of scraping walls as the glass walls around him lifted and retracted into slots in the ceiling. A thought struck him - without the insulating effect of the walls, wasn’t the energy siphon useless? He stiffened, his fingers flexing and curling as he suddenly contemplated the possibility of bolting for the door. Then he could run through the hall, find a window or an exit, and --

Dr. Grey’s hand landed on one of his wrists, her other arm reaching under the lip of the table and rummaging for something attached to the side. Krel froze, the sudden closeness paralyzing him into inaction as she brought flat cords into view, draping them over his arms and legs.

“W- weren’t you going to test my environmental limits or something?” Krel asked nervously as Dr. Grey moved around his head to the other side of the table. She said nothing for a moment, tugging a cord that lay across his top pair of wrists, lower forearms, and stomach. Satisfied, she began tying the cord to the metal handrail on the side. Terror welled in Krel’s core, and he asked more urgently, “Aren’t you supposed to do other tests?”

“Interesting,” Dr. Grey murmured. “You have a strong self-preservation instinct. Drones are probably hellishly expensive to make,” she added under her breath as she reached for another cord, this one lying across Krel’s shins. “Makes sense for them to take care of themselves.” She tied the cord firmly, testing the knot with a few sharp yanks.

“Hey, are you listening?” Krel interrupted, panic creeping into his voice. Dr. Grey gave him a passing glance as she moved up the table, looming directly over him as she pulled a cord over his forehead, which chafed uncomfortably against the delicate arc traced between his brows.

“My employers don’t appreciate the urgency of the situation,” she said offhandedly. “For all I know, you’ve already sent out a distress signal and alien ships are descending upon us as we speak. I need to collect your most vital information immediately, before you get rescued or initiate another self-destruct protocol.”

Krel’s breath hitched. “I'm not going to get rescued - no one knows I'm here!” he protested, his pleas falling on deaf ears. Desperately, he asked, “What information do you want? Tell me what information is vital, and I will give it to you. You don’t have to _take_ it.”

Dr. Grey didn’t respond at first. She finished tying the last of the cords and examined Krel with renewed interest. Her hands hovered over his core for a moment, then fluttered down his body to press against his sides, just beneath his second pair of arms. “Fascinating,” she said quietly, “that your exterior mimics the appearance of flesh, and even goes so far as to include the sensation of bones underneath. I can feel ribs here -- and yet I know from your scans that you are hollow, save for the computer that programs your every thought. Your false body is meant to invoke empathy in the native species of the planets you study, but you do not perceive your own state of being. How can I trust such a simple drone to understand its own existence?”

Dr. Grey disappeared from Krel’s line of sight as she retreated back to her desk, the soft scuffing of her shoes the only sound in the room. Indignation sent a pang through Krel’s chest at the insult, but he was far too focused on the meaning of her words to find the energy to be angry about it.

“But Oliver said -”

“Oliver was a necessary witness. By bringing the simple instruments of the first tests approved by protocol to this room, he can now testify that I intended to begin with the first procedures as dictated by policy. But unfortunately,” she sighed, “the subject wouldn’t cooperate, and with excessive use of the energy siphon, I feared its fuel source would become too depleted. A shame, that the robot refused to go along with the tests. Regretfully, I was forced to go straight to clinical disassembly in order to study its internal mechanisms.” Dr. Grey finished the speech with a disappointed _tut_ , approaching the table once more. The squeak of wheels caught Krel’s attention, and he twisted his neck as much as possible to catch a glimpse of the small cart that she had pushed over to the table, the tray on top hiding its contents from view.

“That's not what happened!”

“Perhaps not, little drone. But it's what needed to happen, for the sake of science. You present too many unknowns, and hold potentially invaluable data that I cannot place at risk for the sake of ignoring those unknowns,” Dr. Grey said matter-of-factly.

“Data like internal mechanisms?”

Krel began to struggle in earnest at the flat silence that followed his question, but the flat cords kept him thoroughly pinned to the table. In desperation, he reached once more into his core for his energy banks, only to have his breath stolen by the searing bolt of pain that lanced through him at the attempt. Pushing through the agony, Krel strained to find the raging storm of energy, plunging through the depths of all his core’s functions as he searched blindly.

Dr. Grey leaned over him, meeting his frightened gaze with her smiling face.

“Little drone,” she whispered, “it was nice to meet you.”

Time seemed to suspend itself for an instant, Krel’s wide eyes searching Dr. Grey’s face as she looked away. The sound of metal softly clinked as she reached into the tray.

 _There_ it was - he lunged for his energy banks. He’d almost made it - in his mind, his outstretched fingers brushed the border of his reserves, ready to snatch his salvation from the jaws of despair.

Then a small, cold blade bit into his upper shoulder and slid cleanly toward the center of his chest, and the world shattered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm afraid the next update will be coming Tuesday, September 1, due to personal reasons. If all goes well, I may update before then, but the next chapter will come by then at the latest. Thank you all for your understanding. :)
> 
> Comments make my day!
> 
> **EDIT: Please read the summary


	6. Firefly Burning

The harsh rasp of a file was what woke up Jim, in the end. He was dozing between layers of tranquil comfort, only vaguely aware of the hunched curve of his spine and the slow ache of his neck. The shriek and groan of the sharp-toothed metal as it dragged across his horn slowly filtered through the quiet, the subtle tug of his skull from one side to the other nudging him to wakefulness.

Jim opened his eyes, blinking to clear the layers of static, and remained motionless for half a moment, taking in the muted light and featureless walls through bleary vision. He was kneeling, his arms outstretched to either side, his head limply hanging over his chest, yet the awkward position seemed almost comfortable. He idly wondered where he was, his mind slow to surface from the waking dream.

In the next instant, half-remembered images flooded his mind and sent a jolt of liquid panic through his veins. His muscles bunched under his stone skin as if his body were not his own, and he was in motion before he could think, wrenching himself to the side with a rattling jerk of chains. His right arm yanked taut with a painful strain of ligaments, and Jim froze, eyes flicking to the side. His wrist was encircled with a broad metal cuff fastened over his armor, the shiny links leading to a thick metal post embedded in the vinyl floor. Jim tugged furiously at the short chain again, and caught the dull gleam of a padlock securing him to the post.

“Will you _please_ hold still?” A sharp voice suddenly complained from behind Jim. His breath caught, and he twisted as much as he could to see who had spoken. A girl -- no older than twenty, he guessed -- glared down at him from behind, seeming thoroughly unimpressed at his behavior. She was wearing a white lab coat with a laminated badge pinned to the pocket, and was holding a Petri dish in one hand, gesturing animatedly with a large metal file she held in the other. Jim’s gaze was drawn to the file, the blunted sunlight catching the edge of the dull steel, and he suddenly became aware of the hunger chewing through his stomach. He hadn’t eaten since -- since they had begun walking at sunset. They -- oh, God. Claire. Trollmarket. _Kilura_.

The full horror of last night crashed into Jim, terror welling in his throat as the girl continued talking, her words barely audible over the sudden roaring in Jim’s ears.

“The _least_ you could do is let me finish up here so I could get back to my actual job,” the girl complained. “I swear, this is the last time I do Mr. Dauberon a favor. I could be getting _real_ experience in the sequencing center right now, but _noo_ , I have to babysit the new subject he couldn’t be bothered to look after.”

It took Jim a moment to process the fact that the last jab was directed contemptuously at himself, still struggling to tamp down the overwhelming confusion and fear that threatened to overtake him.

“I’m sorry, what?”

There was a distinct, empty silence in the room, a gaping swell of absence where there should have been sound. Even as the girl answered, it seemed out of place - a singer with no accompaniment. As if a dimension were missing.

“Mr. Dauberon’s off with another subject, leaving _me_ to handle the experiment he’s _actually_ in charge of. I’m just saying, if I had a permanent position here, I wouldn’t leave the sample collecting to an _intern_.” The girl sighed, looking contemplatively into her Petri dish. “I guess that should be enough,” she muttered. She absentmindedly circled around Jim, setting down her tools on a table shoved against the far wall. Jim squinted through the muted rays of sunlight permeating the room to take in his surroundings, the curiously blank walls and floor making his environment seem oddly flat.

Jim needed to get back to Claire and Blinky. The trolls needed him, now more than ever, and he was stuck -- trapped in an empty room, with a strange girl and the unspoken promise of more danger on the horizon. Suddenly, the thought of looking for a window of opportunity to escape seemed even more pressing.

Jim opened his mouth, licking his lips nervously. A thin layer of ash coated his tongue. “Please,” he said nervously, “can you tell me where I am?”. He yanked viciously at the chains again, but they held firm.

“Sure, but first you have to stop tearing up the foundations,” the girl responded dryly, with a pointed look at the metal posts Jim was straining against. Jim hesitated, but relaxed just a fraction, fixing his gaze on the girl hopefully. She nodded with satisfaction.

“You have the honor,” she began, her voice dripping in admiration, “of being in the care of the Applied Sciences Research and Development Institute -- ASRID for short -- which is a really vague name that doesn’t really tell you anything. What we do here is find inexplicable occurrences like _you_ \--” she pointed at him accusingly with a ballpoint pen -- “and figure out how to make them useful to our clients. It’s a great opportunity to work here. Incredibly difficult to get your foot in the door, of course, but the opportunities are unlike anywhere else. I’m Kelly, by the way. Genetic sequencing.”

“What?”

“I work in genetic sequencing. Or at least I will, after I finish this internship. You’re not very quick, are you?”

“Rude,” Jim retorted automatically.

“Anyway, technically you’re Mr. Dauberon’s experiment, but he’s busy at the moment. Speaking of which...” Kelly unclipped a walkie-talkie from her waist and spoke into it with a burst of static. “Mr. Dauberon, your subject is awake in room four-two-six. Please acknowledge.”

Jim and Kelly stared at each other for a moment, the static crackling in the air. Then a small voice came through - “On my way. Stand by.”

The veneer of politeness shattered. Dread bubbled up in Jim’s chest, the unseen apparition of Mr. Dauberon striking anxiety into his heart. “Wait,” he said uncertainly, hoping that he was wrong. “Why tell me anything? Aren’t I just a test subject?”

Kelly inhaled long and deep, her dark eyes seeming to flicker with remorse for a second. Or perhaps it was only the light. Then she smiled at Jim, casually leaning back against the table.

“It’s hard to find conversation here. Everyone’s very busy, with good reason. When I do get a chance to talk to someone, they’re never interested. But you don’t really have a choice, do you? You can’t go anywhere.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Jim snapped. “Why talk to me like I’m human? Why assume I can _speak_?” He tugged at the chains for effect, the metal links groaning under the effort of keeping him restrained. “Why not assume I’m just a mindless _beast_ to - to collect _samples_ from and _experiment_ on? Why is your _test subject_ your only option for conversation? If you can talk to me and I can talk back, _why keep me here_?”

There was a heavy, tense silence. Then Kelly broke into a radiant smile. Jim’s heart sank.

“You’re just like a lab rat,” she said almost affectionately. “Rats can feel emotions, just like humans do. They can feel pain. They can feel love. But ultimately, they are in a lab, and their purpose is to serve whatever experiment they’ve been assigned to. If we didn’t have any lab rats, it would be much more difficult to get anything done - advances in psychology would be limited, the biomedical field would crumble, and genetic modeling would be torn to shreds. The scientific model would be crippled. And right now, _you_ are much, much more valuable than a rat.”

Jim’s heart plummeted, his face crumpling. “A lab rat?” he whispered. The terror that had been building in him curdled, twisting his insides and condensing into smoldering fury that sparked and flared. “How _dare_ you.” The fire raced down his arms and coiled in his clenched fists, and he dragged them forward, the chains screaming at the stress.

Kelly’s face remained neutral, but her eyebrows drew together as Jim bent down and twisted to get at one of the chains. Without thinking, he raised his hand and gripped the chain in his teeth, tasting the smoky carbon and cold steel. His powerful jaw set, and he bit down with enough force to crack the links, the metal shrieking as his tusks crunched through the chain.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Kelly, her mouth dropping open in shock as he slowly chewed, the chain links twisting between his teeth, and swallowed. The metal sliding down his throat felt _so_ good after spending the whole night walking, and running, and fighting, and almost getting _killed_. At least he wouldn’t die hungry. He shook his freed arm, the dislodged links falling from the cuff and clattering to the floor. Then he raised his other hand.

In a blur, Kelly darted to the door and slipped out, the handle clicking into place as the sound of her running footsteps faded down the hall. Jim clamped the other chain between his jaws and ripped himself free, spitting out the mangled links as he rushed forward after her. Here, at last, was his chance.

  
-  
  


The guard sighed, resisting the urge to pull a cigarette from his pocket as he shuffled the thin stack of papers on the table. Smoking was strictly forbidden on campus grounds, and he didn’t dare risk his employment over something so objectively trivial as a smoke - his fear of getting fired somehow outweighed the welling desperation, and he was professional enough to ignore both emotions.

He leaned back in his chair, appraising the nervous figure sitting across from him with a bored eye. The interns were getting younger and younger, he mused. Hell if he knew why. This kid didn’t even look like he’d graduated high school yet -- sweater vest notwithstanding -- but the higher-ups were crawling over themselves to get him in the door. Management worked in mysterious ways, he supposed.

“So let me get this straight,” he said finally. “You came here because of an ad in the paper?”

Toby Domzalski grinned hopefully and laid the newspaper on the table between them, pointing out an advertisement that had been circled several times in black ink. “My Nana pointed it out, actually,” he explained. “She always reads the paper in the morning -- or she tries to. Good thing the font was so big, huh?”

“Good thing indeed,” the guard mumbled with annoyance as he glanced at the paper. ENTRY-LEVEL GEOLOGIST WANTED, read the title in bold text. He’d had to get up at four in the morning to personally swap out the specially tailored newspaper at this kid’s address. They hadn't had the personnel to send someone else, was the excuse from his boss. Bullshit.

“So, uh... what do you think of my resume?” the kid asked, fidgeting. “The ad did say ‘entry-level’, so, you know, I thought I’d give it a shot, right?”

The guard scanned the resume briefly, taking in the name _Tobias Domzalski_ printed at the top. The ‘experience’ section simply read: Geology Club President, two years. Unspecified field experience, one year. Award-winning movie director. Hero of the town.

If the guard actually gave a damn about the quality of this resume, he would’ve ignited it with his lighter and let it burn. Luckily, the only thing he was paid to care about was the name. Still - he let the kid stew for a minute, appraising the paper as if scrutinizing every word. He could _feel_ the anxiety radiating off the kid and thickening in the air as they both sat in silence.

Finally, he became bored of the game.

“Actually, it looks like you’d be a great fit for the job,” the guard recited, recalling the script drilled into his head. “We have some terms and conditions.”

Toby looked ready to explode with joy, but restrained himself remarkably well. “Naturally,” he sniffed. “And what would those terms and conditions be?”

“For starters,” began the guard, “this is a boarded position. We will provide food and lodging for the duration of your internship, but you will not be allowed to leave campus grounds.”

Toby frowned, but remained silent. Smart.

“In order to protect potentially sensitive data being handled here, you’ll be required to sign a non-disclosure agreement. Additionally, you must turn over any electronic devices in your possession for the duration of your internship. Any questions?”

“Just one,” Toby said. “What kind of ‘sensitive data’ has anything to do with rocks and minerals?”

“That’s the facility’s concern, not yours,” the guard admonished. “There’s a lot of information being handled at the facility, and they want to be as cautious as possible.”

“Yeah, that’s fair,” Toby admitted. “Anything else?”

“Just sign here, and you’re good to go.” The guard slid a piece of paper across the table, unhooking a pen from his breast pocket to place next to it.

“Wait, like _now_?”

“Yes, now,” the guard said impatiently. Management had made it very clear that the kid was not to leave the facility until he’d signed the contract.

The kid’s face screwed up in distaste, clearly already twitching for his cell phone. He hesitated, and for a moment the guard felt the overwhelming fear of facing his superiors in the wake of failure.

Abruptly, the kid sighed in resignation and grabbed for the pen. “Opportunities, right? This could be the beginning of a long and illustrious career,” he mumbled, scrawling his name with a messy flourish.

The guard snatched away the contract as soon as pen left paper, scanning the document as if to verify the testimony of his own eyes. The dull ink of Toby’s name refused to fade, however, and a slow smile of satisfaction crept across the man’s face. It was done. A cool wave of relief washed over his shoulders, and he folded the paper with sharp, crisp lines. Setting his shoulders, he resumed his cool glare, levelling it at the kid’s cautiously excited face.

“Electronic devices, please,” he insisted. The kid deflated a bit, but pushed his cell phone across the table. The guard took it and turned to unlock a drawer in his empty file cabinet, unceremoniously dropping the phone in with a clatter of metal. Turning back, he stretched out his hand again, raising an eyebrow at the kid’s smart watch.

Toby glanced at his wrist and jumped, slightly, as if he’d forgotten it was there.

“Ha, sorry about that!” Toby chuckled nervously as he undid the clasp, shoving the watch across the table. “Old habits.”

The guard locked away his possessions without another word, sighing as he made his way to the inner door of the gatehouse. Opening it, he stepped out into the crisp air, a dappled blanket of clouds hanging gray and foreboding overhead. The cold air nibbled at the edges of his uniform and stole into his collar, raising gooseflesh as his steely eyes took in the environment he’d seen a thousand times before. The kid shuffled out behind him, staring open-mouthed at the sprawling mess of buildings that stretched beyond them.

The thin road wound ahead, passing through the gate at their backs and snaking ahead between dozens of short, flat buildings. The early rays of sun were scorching the mist-damp grass, burning the dew into curling mist that twisted and lapped at the base of the whitewashed walls of the buildings. As Toby took it all in, noting the chain-link fence stretching around the edges of his vision and the foreboding wall of trees that loomed just beyond, he suppressed a shiver.

“Welcome, Tobias,” the guard finished, “to the Applied Sciences Research and Development Institute.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I just moved across the country.
> 
> I'm a bit behind on illustrations, but please enjoy this [Trollhunters tribute painting](https://taggerbug.tumblr.com/post/629648934874349568/destiny-is-a-gift-never-forget-that-fear-is-but) in the meantime! 
> 
> I'm also taking painting requests for a limited time to celebrate a follower milestone. Feel free to send me a suggestion on my tumblr through asks.
> 
> Thank you all for the sweet comments and messages!! It absolutely makes my day every time. Like I've said, this fic is going to end up being around 300k words, so it's lovely to hear that people are enjoying it. It makes it a lot easier and more enjoyable to write, too, because I look forward to posting chapters and hearing what you guys think. :p
> 
> As always, thanks for reading! Check the summary later for an updated chapter schedule.


	7. Heart Heavy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, if there's anything you can't handle, please contact me on tumblr @taggerbug before reading.
> 
> Enjoy!

A heavy darkness hung over the room. It was a patient, comforting sort of darkness, the sort that might reside in a closet that hadn't been opened in years, or that might linger in the undisturbed gap between the floorboards and foundation of a house. The blinking lights of the monitors didn’t bother the shadows - they were too solid for that. Even as the flickering indicators flashed on and off, sending jittery beams of color over the cramped contents of the room, still the darkness remained quiet and content.

Abruptly, a spasming blue light choked to life, wildly casting its harsh glow over the equipment in the room, scattering the shadows like cockroaches back into the corners of their home. Just as quickly, the light faltered, and for a moment it dimmed so much as to go out completely. The darkness in the room crept back with renewed hope, but the blue light rallied, filling the room with stark illumination accompanied by a low, vibrating hum.

The source of the light seemed to lift itself, rattling faintly against the underside of its plastic cradle as it came into view - a curiously shaped object, smooth edges gently carved with delicate swirls and gracefully curving edges. A slow whine filled the air - the sound of a billion computer processors crying out in confusion as they tried to process their environment, the light flooding the room and pressing against the walls as if perplexed by its confinement.

The door suddenly opened, the comfortable limbo of the room thrown into chaos. A light switch was flipped on, and harsh fluorescent light glared down from above, washing out the vibrant blue from the glowing object. It shrank back into its enclosure slightly, the frantic rattling hesitating. The stern click of shoes against the flooring echoed loudly in the deathly stillness, the object by now completely motionless and silent, as if hoping to avoid detection.

Dr. Grey reached the plastic case and peered in at Krel’s core, the wrinkles around her eyes creasing as she paused to assess it. A yawning chasm stretched between them, the room holding its breath as it waited for the woman or the core to make a move. Then the moment passed, and Dr. Grey was all business, unhooking tubes and wires from the machines surrounding the plastic case and deftly arranging them like a musician tuning the strings of her instrument. The core jumped back to life as if startled, and began to fling itself desperately against the underside of the securely fastened covering with muffled _thunks_.

Without skipping a beat, Dr. Grey adjusted a dial on the side of one of the machines, and the core sank down to the floor of its case, light dimming, as if the energy to fight had seeped out of it. The danger negated, Dr. Grey finally unclasped the sides of the lid, reaching in to grab the core with all the detached caution of a surgeon scooping out an organ to cradle in her hands.

Setting the core in an aluminum frame crowning one of the machines, Dr. Grey wound the small knobs on either side to tighten the metal bands, stepping back to survey her work. She tested the fit of the bindings with a tug of the core, but it didn’t budge. Satisfied, she returned to her preparations, pulling the nose of a massive ceiling-mounted industrial laser across its sliding rack until it was positioned directly above the core. Humming to herself absentmindedly, Dr. Grey calibrated the machine, adjusting the sliders on a control panel set into the base and flicking a final switch. The machine began to buzz as it slowly awoke, and Dr. Grey hurried for the door, closing it behind her as she stepped out into the hallway.

Resisting the urge to look behind her through the small window set into the door, Dr. Grey stared resolutely down the empty hallway, allowing herself a small smile as the cyan light suddenly burst through the glass of the window and around the edges of the doorway with clawing beams desperately fleeing the room.

Although she could not hear it, the pitch too high for human ears to detect, there were a billion computer processors in that room screaming in pain. As the whine of the laser grew louder, the agony of the core seemed to jump from one machine to the next, each monitor suddenly wailing and flashing its display in convoluted snarls of pixels that twisted and writhed into each successive device. The awful song thrashed its way around the room, as if seeking refuge, but the shriek of the laser penetrated every corner of the room, filling it with a searing heat, and nowhere was safe. The monitors and machines suddenly all went blank, gasping and retching, and the core flared bright, blinding blue, the noiseless howl of the processors abruptly choking on themselves as the laser finally, blissfully, went dark.

The flare of light, however, remained, suffusing the room with a soulless glow. Beams of light dragged themselves from the core, tethered to their source, and fell into the air as if dripping through layers of oil. As Dr. Grey carefully opened the door, peering back into the room, the lights condensed, swirling together into an oddly familiar shape.

-

“Any word on what this could mean?” Dr. Grey asked. She restlessly shuffled the notes scrawled across loose paper on a small desk shoved to the side of the room, long since abandoned in the days since the few staff with any background in astronomy had begun analyzing the baffling image.

Marvin Hendrick’s gaze didn’t move from the sight, his eyes fixed on the mysterious projection that still stubbornly hovered in the air. The dust motes in the room swirled through the blue light as he spoke. “As far as we can tell so far, it’s a real location in space - the arrangement of the planet and its satellites makes sense, at least. We’re still trying to chart the star placements, see if there’s any public record that we can compare it to. It’ll take some time to estimate where it’s actually placed, but that’s not - really quite incredible, it’s - I’ve never seen anything like it, Alex.”

Dr. Grey didn’t respond to the nickname for a moment, still drinking in the sight of the projection: a single massive globe, casually circled by three arching rings and too many moons to count. The planet slowly turned, the moons dutifully following in their slow orbital paths. Small, shining pinpricks - no, stars - studded the empty space at the fringes of the image, the glowing objects all tethered by their beams of light to the small alien computer sitting silently in its box.

“I don’t think,” she finally thought to say, “that _anyone_ on Earth has ever seen anything like this, Marv.”

They shared a solemn moment of voiceless wonder, stunned by the dawning realization that they had stumbled across something truly momentous. Neither of them had slept much in the weeks since the robot had been captured, and now that the tests had gleaned _this_ kind of response? It would have been enough to strike a foreboding sense of awe and unexplainable dread into the heart of anyone who stopped to truly consider it - the terrible, visual witness of a race far older and more learned than these cosmic archaeologists, playing with knowledge billions of years beyond their comprehension.

It was Marvin who broke the silence first, setting forth a hesitant question, as if only daring to ask.

“You said that this... this robot - it came from a different planet? Are you _sure_?”

A surge of anger blinded Dr. Grey for a moment, the audacity of Marvin’s cautious words stabbing deep into her gut as if a declaration of betrayal.

“Sure enough to stake my career on it,” she whispered icily.

Marvin’s face set, for he knew that her career was her life, and her life was dedicated to this - the ultimate quest for knowledge, unencumbered by philosophical concerns and empowered by the perhaps most resourceful facility in the world. It was the perfect climate for only the most serious of academics, and Dr. Grey and Marvin both knew it. To risk it all for such an outlandish claim was unthinkable, unless there was a possibility - however slight - that it was _real_.

Marvin fell silent again, at that, and they both stared silently again at the projection sprouting from Krel’s core, the imposing sphere of Akiridion-5 flickering in the darkness.

-

“Say that to me again.”

Dr. Grey’s shoes clacked against the tile, drumming an impatient pace as she hurried down the hallway. The intern - God, there were so many interns, they were like _locusts_ \- nervously stammered, trying to keep up with Dr. Grey’s rush.

“Mr. Hendricks said that they’ve figured out the star map, ma’am. The planet is hundreds of light years from Earth, but he said that’s not important -”

“Not _important_? I managed to wring the _exact location_ of that robot’s planet out of it _weeks_ ago, and it’s not important?”

“Well - not exactly - he said there’s a hidden message in the projection. Instructions for how to return the robot to its owners. There’s -”

“ _Why_ ,” Dr. Grey asked tightly, a few passing heads turning, “would I want to _return it_? Just when it was beginning to cooperate?”

“Ma’am, please,” the intern almost begged, “Mr. Hendricks says that he can contact them. You said the robot was valuable - you’ll be able to negotiate for whatever you want.”

Dr. Grey stopped dead in her tracks, staring at the intern mutely.

“Dear,” she said at last, “you should have led with that.”

-

“Put it on the big screen,” Dr. Grey said breathlessly. Marvin tapped a few keys, and suddenly all eyes in the room were on the large computer screen mounted to the wall, staring at the sudden image of a seated blue figure staring imperiously through the screen with black eyes that sent a chill up Dr. Grey’s spine.

This person - no, this _alien_ \- looked so similar to the little robot it was uncanny. Yet, there were clear differences - this figure was draped with delicate, shimmering fabrics, its face adorned with gleaming silver lines and framed by a bony crest that twisted from the top of its head. This alien, surely, was part of the intellectual sector that was responsible for _creating_ the robot - or even a member of the ruling class that supervised all else.

The figure shifted, sending a sudden ripple of surprise through the assembled scientists in the room as it addressed them in perfect English.

“Humans of planet Earth,” it inclined its head ever so slightly, “I am Aja of House Tarron, Queen of Akiridion-5, from the divine lineage of Seklos the Vanquisher. I understand that you have found one of my citizens.”

Dr. Grey was bewildered into silence for a moment, floored by the cultural implications of such brief sentences. Automatically, she responded, her mouth speaking as if disconnected from her body.

“You would be correct. We discovered one of your robotic scouts several weeks ago and have been studying it under the supervision of Earth’s most capable scientists. We meant no offense at this intrusion - surely you can understand our desire to learn whatever we can from you?”

The queen’s eyes narrowed, taking a moment to digest the words before her voice grew steely. “Has the... _scout_ been harmed?”

“No, of course not,” Dr. Grey rushed to assure her. The way the alien’s hand tightened on her staff, the drawn appearance of her unfamiliar face - somehow, even though Dr. Grey _knew_ the alien was seated all the way across the universe, a sense of unease refused to allow her to relax. The threat of danger, however irrational, seemed imminent. “The computer at the center of the robot is intact, and it has demonstrated its ability to regenerate its outer body with no issues.”

There was a long moment of silence, tension suddenly crackling into the air like ozone. The alien queen’s posture shifted again, somehow, and every nerve in Dr. Grey’s body suddenly screamed at her to run away, _now!_

Dr. Grey refused to concede to such silly impulses. Even if she had somehow angered the alien, there was nothing the queen could do about it, locked behind a computer screen and billions of miles of an empty vacuum. As advanced as this alien race was, they still had to obey the basic laws of physics, and this gave Dr. Grey confidence.

“I want to see him,” the alien declared in a commanding tone. “ _Now_.”

The scientists in the room glanced at Dr. Grey in confusion as her mind frantically worked to stay ahead. She turned to the intern who had brought her the news, still gaping at the screen.

“You,” Dr. Grey murmured. The intern didn’t look away, her face still blank. Dr. Grey cleared her throat. The intern flinched, and frantically looked around before she caught Dr. Grey’s expression.

“You heard her,” Dr. Grey said in a low voice, a smile firmly plastered to her face. “Please go retrieve the robot.”

Without a word, the intern scrambled out of the room, her running footsteps fading down the hall. Dr. Grey looked back at the screen, where the alien appeared to have slightly relaxed.

“Your... your majesty,” she began, the uncertainty of the title sharp in her throat, “we are, of course, willing to return the robot to your people.”

The alien was almost smiling now, one hand rising to her face as if to hide a burst of laughter. Dr. Grey pressed on.

“However, you must realize the position we are in - as scholars and custodians of our planet’s scientific progression, we have a duty. The robot would have given us a wealth of knowledge, which is hardly replaceable.”

The amusement fell from the alien’s face, and she leaned forward slightly to hear Dr. Grey’s carefully chosen words.

“All we ask for is a simple exchange - we release the robot to your custody, and you compensate us with materials that are more easily replaceable for you.”

“And what materials would those be?” the alien asked dryly. Dr. Grey opened her mouth to respond, but just then the door opened, and all attention turned to the figures being hastily ushered through the doorway.

There was only one guard accompanying the intern and the precious subject, and even then it was hardly a necessity. The robot walked slowly, dragging its feet; it hunched over, four arms gripping each other loosely as if for support. The blue glow that had been so prominent in the beginning of the study was almost nonexistent now, its face and hands dulled to a matte sheen. Its eyes were half-lidded, and it raised its face to look at the screen with an unfocused look. If it were human, Dr. Grey would categorize its appearance as one beset by extreme exhaustion - admittedly, she had been a little overzealous with her use of the energy siphon in the past weeks, but it was warranted.

After the robot had dissolved at the first cut of a scalpel, even its computer had resisted further tests. But the energy siphon made it _so_ compliant, and without the false body wrapped around the computer to scream and protest, Dr. Grey was able to progress in her work without interruption. Several weeks of examination and tests in blissful peace and quiet were lovely, but she had begun to worry that she had caused irreparable harm somehow when its disguise failed to reform. That was when the scientists who’d built the siphon showed her how to reverse its function.

Flooding a computer with massive amounts of its own nuclear energy to force it to regenerate its puppet body was an unorthodox approach, but an effective one. Fortunately, the energy siphon was very precise, meaning that Dr. Grey could keep the robot to heel without allowing it to escape back into its computer. She really did owe her colleagues for that.

“Krel,” the alien queen gasped, and Dr. Grey shot a look at the screen. The alien had blanched, its hands suddenly clutching the fabric of its garments, one hand on the armrest as if to get up. She hesitated, but continued to speak in a shaky voice. “It seems you really have found one of our... scouts.”

“Yes, I apologize for its appearance,” Dr. Grey responded lightly. “but as you can see, there is no lasting damage. I must pay a compliment to your inventors - its design is nearly invulnerable. Exquisite, really.” She didn’t recognize the first word the alien had said. Perhaps it was a classification, the name for the robot scouts in their native tongue.

“Very well,” the alien said distractedly, a shadow crossing her face. “What is it you want in return for the _safe_ ,” she stressed, “return of the scout?”

“Not much!” Dr. Grey hurried to respond brightly. “If you have some similar technology at your disposal that we could study -”

“Aja,” interrupted the robot suddenly, its small voice loud in the otherwise silent room.

Dr. Grey turned to regard it with interest. It hadn't spoken a word since its forced return to form, and now it was addressing its queen directly? The other scientists stared, the whole room holding its breath.

“Aja, where are you?” The robot was staring at the screen now, its black eyes wide. It spoke quickly, as if it feared its voice would fail. “I waited for so - for so long. No one’s coming. I’m sorry I didn’t go with you, _please_ \- I’ll come back to Akiridion, I’ll do anything, just _please_ get me out of here, Aja, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry...”

“Krel, please -” the alien tried to reason with the robot, but it continued, its voice rising into harsh shouts.

“No one came for me. I waited and waited, but no one came. Not you, not Seklos, not anyone.” Its tone became accusatory. “Do you know what they did to me, Aja? Do you know what they’ve _DONE?_ ”

The alien looked horrified, her face contorting into an expression of concern. “I promise I’m going to get you out of there, Krel,” she promised, her voice thick with emotion. “I can’t lose you too, not after Mama and Papa gave their _lives_ -”

She cut herself off, as if realizing she’d let something slip.

The scientists, looking back and forth between the robot and the alien queen, all nearly snapped their necks to stare in shock at the queen. She looked back with a blank expression, one that slowly faded into terror as she realized that they understood her perfectly.

Dr. Grey was the first to collect herself, closing her open mouth and tugging at the hem of her jacket. A gleeful sort of satisfaction swelled in her chest and threatened to split her face into a radiant smile. Forget the once-in-a-lifetime chance to study an alien robot - now she had the _entire race_ of alien robots in the palm of her hand. The sibling of their _queen_? The potential was limitless.

“Well,” she said into the bewildered silence, all business, “it seems we have something quite a bit more valuable than a scout.” She would wonder how a race of robots were able to come up with the concept of family later, but for now, it was an effective tool. “Guard, please escort the subject back to my room.”

The robot sagged as the guard grabbed one of its arms, offering no resistance as it was led past the door and out of the room. It was a wonder it had had the strength to scream.

The alien queen blinked, her gaze unfocused as she looked at Dr. Grey with sad eyes. The weight of her position seemed to settle on her shoulders, and she drew herself up with resigned dignity.

“What,” she asked tiredly, “do you want from my people in return for my brother, Krel of House Tarron, son of Seklos, heir apparent to an unclaimed throne?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Midterm exams are coming up, so the next chapter might be delayed. I'll post about it on tumblr if that's the case.
> 
> Consider leaving a comment to let me know what you thought! :)


	8. Needle Deep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shows up two months later with a can of coffee* bonjour
> 
> As always, please refer to the warnings in earlier chapters, thank you ^^
> 
> Also, exciting announcement: As Above, So Below has fanart!!!! [Check out this awesome art of Dr. Grey by Blue](https://blue-sparrow-art.tumblr.com/post/635159325853286400/taggerbug-throws-this-at-you-and-runs-away-i) and [this incredible art of Eden by Gwibart](https://trollhuntersimp.tumblr.com/post/634808829464477696/yall-i-loved-taggerbug-s-oc-so-much) (she's a character who'll show up later)! THANK YOU!! :D

The shrill scream of an alarm clock ripped through Toby’s dreamless sleep, dragging him reluctantly to wakefulness. He blinked groggily and sat up, the sudden thrill of remembering where he was pulsing in his veins. With a sudden intake of breath at the thought, he leaned over to hastily shut off the alarm clock and flung back the blanket, sitting up to squint at his room through blurry eyes.

The sight brought no surprises. Toby didn’t want to question the generosity of the facility, but his room always struck him oddly as an afterthought - more of a repurposed utility closet than basic hotel accommodations. There were no windows, the floor was polished concrete, and the smooth walls were cold and painted white. The furnishings were sparse - a thin cot, a rickety nightstand, and an old-fashioned analog alarm clock. A simple bathroom was attached, helpfully stocked with tiny soaps from a motley assortment of hotels. It was just straddling the line of adequacy, seeing as how Toby wasn’t there for leisure - although he did wish there was an ironing board for his wrinkled shirts.

As Toby dressed from a suitcase, he was once again reminded of how creepy the whole deal was - when he accepted the offer and was escorted into one of the facility buildings, he had thought to ask the security guard how he was expected to live there without an overnight bag. What about his clothes, his toothbrush, a comb? The guard had reassured him it was taken care of, and the same evening, a different guard had dropped off a suitcase of essentials at the door of his room, supposedly assembled by his nana. Inside, a note explained that his nana had been informed of his internship and was very proud. The guard must have written it for her, seeing as it was handwritten and not laid out in the usual bold, blocky letters of her printer.

Toby fought back the surge of emotion as he was reminded of her - he missed her, and Arrrgh, and even his occasional video call with Jim and Claire. He hoped they were doing all right. It had been - he checked a scrap of paper he’d tucked into the pocket of his pajamas - three weeks today since he’d checked in.

Once finished getting ready, Toby made sure to grab his identification badge from where it had been carefully placed on his nightstand and clipped it to the hem of his sweater vest. From the security guard’s tone when he had handed it to Toby, he was under the impression that if he forgot to bring the badge with him, he would be lined up in front of a firing squad and shot. Besides, he took this job seriously. They hadn't been lying about the geology work, no matter how _off_ the rest of the deal seemed, and Toby took pride in his science. Part of that was dictating to himself a certain measure of professionalism.

Checking the alarm clock, Toby allowed himself a smug smile as he opened the door and grinned at the guard.

“Right on time today, huh... _Lucas_?”

The guard stared down at him with a sort of disinterested silence, the same silence he’d offered on all twenty previous days that Toby had tried to guess his name. Not-Lucas wasn’t much for conversation, unfortunately, and the lack of any identifying name tag made it hard to connect with the guy. Toby tried not to let it bother him.

The nameless guard started down the hall, interrupting Toby’s musings. Toby hurried after him, looking around curiously as he always did. Somehow, the mystery of this place had become no less inscrutable in the time he’d been there. The cluster of tiny rooms in this corner of the building felt more like a forgotten storage area than a place for people to crash, the tangle of pipes running along the ceiling and linoleum-paneled hallway floor offering a chilled and bare place to call home, however temporarily.

Soon, their surroundings changed - as the hallway broadened, walls became white painted bricks, the occasional thickly-layered window offering a limited glimpse at the featureless outside world, populated only by the stony facades of the other identical buildings. Other people began passing by them, some with white coats and identification badges clipped to their lapels, and still others in the padded black armor of the guards. Everyone seemed to be in a rush, and as if to quietly encourage the haste, the occasional small table standing out awkwardly in the hallway offered boxes of hot coffee and plastic trays of dry bagels. Toby broke away from Not-Lucas to veer by one of the tables, snagging a bagel and hurrying to rejoin him. Not-Lucas didn’t change his pace, and Toby stared at the long, slender baton strapped to the guard’s back as he gnawed on his breakfast, unwilling to try to strike up another chat. The guards made Toby nervous - the same way he’d feel nervous in Arcadia whenever he saw a policeman, for no immediate reason. Even before he and Jim had been arrested for breaking into the museum, and even before he’d managed to land a date with the daughter of the specific cop who’d arrested him - well. The guards still made him nervous.

Not that they’d done anything to justify his fear; the few that had interacted with him had all been perfectly neutral, not quite polite but not rude enough to affront. Like Not-Lucas - his greatest crime was merely being a piss-poor conversation partner. They didn’t even carry guns, as far as Toby had seen, only these odd, long black poles that he assumed were batons of some sort. Logically, there was no reason to be afraid. And yet...

Toby shrugged off the rising feeling of uneasiness, brightening as he recognized the door they were approaching. His worries melted away as he was overcome with a surge of pride. The excitement of having a space here just for him, even if it was only a corner in a crowded lab, made everything worth it. The unexpected room and board, giving up his cell phone, the uninspiring bagels - none of it mattered, really, when Toby could exercise his creativity and knowledge to really _accomplish_ something with geology, in a real laboratory, surrounded by real scientists.

He hastily finished off the remains of his bagel as Not-Lucas reached the entrance to the lab and turned to stand by it, silent and impassive as ever. Toby placed a hand on the door handle, then hesitated and offered a polite grin to the guard.

“Have fun today, Jared,” he tried.

The guard didn’t spare him so much as a glance, maintaining his stony silence. His eyes seemed to flicker between the passing scientists and guards in the hallway, clearly bored already. A long, awkward silence stretched between them, until Toby finally gave up and pushed his way into the lab.

This was his element, the soft white edges and sloping lines outlining the neat edges of tables and drawers, even if it was a little off-putting at first. The unforgiving lights glared down from above, painting the shelves of test tubes and petri dishes with stark illumination as if the entire room were being adjusted on the stage of an enormous microscope by the hand of some unseen giant. It was a slightly unnerving feeling, made even more so by the racks of cages covering one entire wall. Toby glanced at the barred kennels as he passed by them, a thousand pairs of tiny, beady eyes staring back at him. Rats, too many to count, huddled in their cages, neatly sorted into groups with notepads pinned to the locks of their pens. They broke the otherwise glassy stillness with a soft rustling, punctuated by the occasional rasping scrape of a clawed hand against the bare metal of an enclosure.

Toby approached the far wall of the lab, unhooking a clipboard from the wall as he sat down on a stool with a deep sigh. The walk here from his room was long, and he needed to review the hard figures of his data anyway. Squinting down at the paper, he flipped through the pages, rubbing his eyes with the other hand. The experiment he was expected to perform was a fairly straightforward procedure - almost insultingly simple, in fact. The real intrigue lay in how little sense the results presented to him. Toby blearily examined a table of numbers, growing increasingly puzzled. After a long moment, he tossed the clipboard onto a table, sliding off the stool to get started. If he wouldn’t believe the numbers as they taunted him from a page, he may as well force his eyes to bear witness to the absurdity of it all too.

He pulled on a pair of disposable gloves from a box on the counter, turning his attention to the row of tanks set against the wall. They looked almost like the massive fermentation tanks you’d see at a brewery, but just small enough to reasonably fit in the room. Still, Toby thought with annoyance as he twisted the lock on the nearest tank, struggling to heave the lid open by himself - they were enormous enough that even Jim could curl up inside one comfortably, horns and all. That was just too large, regardless of the lack of budget constraints. After all, Toby thought with puzzlement as he climbed onto a stepstool, staring down into the gently lapping solution, he was only growing crystals. How big could they get?

“This sucks,” he said aloud. A long silence stretched from his words. Contrary to what an outside observer might think, he was perfectly aware that his only companions at the time were the rats. Truthfully, their piercing stares and neutral silence made for little better conversation partners than Not-Jared, but there was something comforting about talking aloud to a recipient, however unwilling. It proved to him that there were living beings other than himself, isolated as he was for long periods in the lab. If he listened carefully after speaking, he could occasionally catch an approving _scritch-scritch_ of a rat scrabbling over a piece of cardboard, or the judgemental _crack_ of another one nibbling on a pellet of food. The lab rats had their own language, Toby liked to think, and he was slowly learning to understand it.

Unfortunately, the rats didn’t speak complaints. In that sense, they were closer to mimicking the guards than Toby liked. He sighed, turning his attention back to the tank as he tugged at a wheel, drawing a rope through a pulley system to lift the crystal from the solution. He’d done this before at home, but in paper cups with bits of string and chunks of alum. Adjusting his procedures to larger proportions wasn’t too difficult in theory, but it was certainly unfamiliar to recreate them on such a grand scale.

The stone slowly breached the surface of the liquid it was resting in, and Toby’s brows shot up as it emerged. Most immediately obvious, the shape was wrong - instead of the jutting lines or twisting fractals he was used to seeing in his “homemade” crystals, this one looked almost... _soft_. Not in the literal sense, as the light still reflected angrily off its glassy edges, but in some other, inexplicable impression. The stone seemed almost _swollen_ , its bulging edges swirling over each other in oddly organic forms. But it was more than that - regardless of the shape, which looked a bit like a huge chunk of warmed-over candle wax, the size was simply not possible. Even Toby’s most optimistic expectations, nurtured by the rich chemical soup he’d mixed from the stone shavings he’d been provided, could not possibly account for this amount of growth. It had been barely three weeks, and in that time, the crystal had grown from a tiny chunk of seed material to a massive stone that was rapidly approaching the size of a five-year-old. Toby’s best guess was that some other scientist was sneaking in here after hours and somehow diverting the entire power grid to supply electricity to the pressure setting on the tanks. He liked to joke to himself that the prime suspect was whoever was in charge of the rats - after all, he’d never once seen another person in this room. Not-Jared never crossed the threshold, and day after day in this lab, it was just Toby, the rats, and these impossible crystals.

Toby suppressed a shiver, mechanically going about the motions as he collected his data, making careful notes on his clipboard. Just as he’d thought, the patterns for these crystals were not only unexpected, but unattainable. There was no way for stones to undergo that kind of explosive growth, and he should know - practically ever since he was born, he’d lived and breathed geology. Growing crystals in a supersaturated solution of the same material was child’s play. And yet, even after seeing the trolls and their stone skin defy scientific rules in ways he hadn't thought possible - and this had nothing to do with trolls - there was still no reason for these lab-grown crystals to be this size - to have this _composition_ \- to --

The door crashed open, making Toby nearly jump out of his skin. Whipping around, still clutching his clipboard in shock, he stared at the man who had flung the door open, now half-hovering in the doorway, gaping at Toby like he hadn't meant to make such an entrance. Toby’s eyes fell on the man’s white coat, the white gauze wrapping around his bare arms and neck, the flash of light that caught the man’s glasses. The rats all fell silent in their scratching and their fidgeting, as if they were just as confused as Toby was. An uncertain pause permeated the room.

Toby blinked at the intrusion, climbing down the stepstool and hastily setting his clipboard down on a table. It clattered loudly in the silence, and the rats suddenly returned to life, scrambling noisily over each other and scraping at their cages, a chorus of soft chittering returning back into insistent noise. The man flinched, suddenly hurrying into the room as if a switch had flipped. He stopped jerkily about halfway across the room, suddenly hesitant. Toby cleared his throat.

“Can I help you, sir?” It came out louder and more forceful than he’d intended, made snappish by the weeks of working in isolation. The man looked almost afraid for a moment, but then drew himself up, snatching a folded paper from the pocket of his lab coat.

“Tobias Domzalski?” the man asked seriously, peering at Toby with all the authority of an underpaid employee trying to figure out whether Toby was smuggling candy into a movie theatre.

“Yes, and you are?” Toby asked pointedly. He reached behind him and pulled the heavy lid of the tank he had been working on closed, to protect the chemical bath from dust. This seemed like it might take a while.

The man deflated, running a hand through his curly hair in frustration. The action tugged back the sleeve of his coat, and Toby frowned at the glimpse of furious red skin that crept out of the man’s bandages.

“I’m Oliver Dauberon,” the man finally introduced himself. “I work here,” he added defensively.

Toby wondered what the man had been working on to give him such an injury. Didn't he follow any lab safety protocols?

“I can see that,” Toby retorted drily. “I work here too. So what can I do for you?”

Oliver determinedly unfolded the paper, suddenly crossing the gap between them to hand it to Toby. He took it, examining the wrinkled words as Oliver spoke.

“Effective immediately, your internship is terminated,” Oliver announced, and Toby’s heart sank, even as he read the very same words. “This is due to circumstances outside your control, and as such, you will receive your full compensation as stipulated in your contract. The Applied Sciences Research and Development Institute thanks you for your contribution to their mission. You are now free to leave.”

The clack of a polished boot echoed across the room, and Toby looked up from the note in dismay to see Not-Jared stepping inside the lab for the first time since the first time he’d escorted Toby there. The guard’s face creased with stern disapproval, as if daring Toby to argue.

Toby turned to Oliver, mouth twisting in an indignant frown as he opened it to protest.

“What about my job? My experiments? These stones aren’t normal. You still need me,” he boldly insisted, hoping the guy was naive enough to believe him.

Oliver’s mouth tugged, as if fighting a smile, and a wave of hurt knotted in Toby’s heart as his bluff crumbled. Of course he didn’t matter - he was just an amateur geologist, playing at real science. There were probably ten scientists with doctorate degrees waiting in the wings to take over his position. But to his surprise, Oliver’s voice softened as he consoled Toby.

“I’m sorry, I really am,” Oliver explained apologetically. “We just needed -”.

Not-Jared cleared his throat, and Oliver flinched, shooting the guard a quick glance before continuing. “It’s not your fault, but the experiment failed. So they’re shutting it down.” He shrugged quickly, looking like a puppet being yanked on a string as he did so, his lips drawn in a tight line that offered no further answers.

Toby let out a long breath in disappointment, putting down his pen next to his clipboard in defeat. He should have seen this coming - the data was so off, he must have screwed it up somehow. But still - it was hard to accept that it was really over, so soon after it had started. He certainly wasn’t about to argue with the long baton strapped to Not-Jared’s back, anyway.

Toby slouched to the door, miserably waiting for Not-Jared to make his exit, and turned to look back at the lab one last time before leaving.

Oliver was standing in the back, already flipping through Toby’s clipboard of carefully logged data with disquieting interest, the shiny veneer of red skin around his bandages obvious now as his neck craned toward the table. The metal tanks stood behind him, silent and accusing, each one holding an unseen impossibility of geological science, nestled in their amniotic soups of stone shavings. And the rats, usually so vocal and active, were sitting completely motionless, each one of them pointed in the same direction - their quivering snouts all crammed through the bars of their cages, all pointed unblinkingly at Toby.

He hurried from the room.

The walk from the lab to his sleeping quarters was just as long as it had been a scant few hours ago, and somehow even more depressing. Not-Jared stood dutifully outside as Toby gathered his few belongings, at the last minute sweeping the hotel soaps into his suitcase out of spite. He found Not-Jared waiting for him outside the door, ready to silently escort him from the building and all the way to the gatehouse he’d entered in what seemed like a lifetime ago.

Somehow, the same security guard was hunched inside, waiting at some unknown signal to toss Toby’s phone and watch onto the table. Toby took the devices, slipping the phone into his pocket as he buckled the watch back onto his wrist absentmindedly. The situation still didn’t feel quite real to him - any second now, the guard would yell at him to hand over the watch, and he’d walk back onto campus. Past the other buildings, through the single doorway his intern card allowed him access to, and back into the lab with the chorus of rats and tanks of impossibility that he had yet to puzzle out.

He had the distinct, unrelenting feeling that he’d grazed the surface of something _incredible_ , something so morbidly absurd by scientific laws that it bordered on obscene - and here he was, throwing away his chance to unlock the secret that he was sure loomed beyond those chain-link fences and tempered glass. What had gone so wrong?

-

Toby watched the black van peel away from his driveway with faint detachment, clutching the handle of his suitcase with a rigid grip. Shaking his head, he turned to climb the steps into his house, resolving to put the entire disappointing experience behind him. Nothing had come out of it, so there was no use in dwelling on it any longer.

“Nana?” He called as he stepped into the darkened foyer, carefully closing the front door behind him. The house was uncharacteristically quiet, dust motes floating slowly through the last beams of dying light that splayed over the walls. The suitcase hung heavy in his grip, so Toby elected to climb the stairs to set it down on his bed.

Letting out a heavy breath, he pulled his phone from his pocket, instinctively pressing the power button to call Jim. No battery. Of course - it had been sitting in a file cabinet for three weeks, without anyone bothering to charge it, Toy thought irritably. Plugging it into the charging cable, he left the phone to recover on his nightstand as he crossed the room to peer out his window.

Oh - there was Nana watering the plants, shielded from the afternoon sun in the looming shadow of the house. Arrrgh was settled comfortably next to her, appearing to be listening as she pointed out different sections of the back garden, aiming the hose as she gestured. She was likely explaining the watering schedules to him. Nana loved her garden, and it was nice to see Arrrgh turn his head attentively, as if he were trying to commit her lecture to memory. Despite his wallowing misery, Toby gave a small smile as he watched. They were familiar, and comforting, and surely he would feel better after talking to them.

On his way out of his room, however, his phone screen lit up brightly, finally awake. Toby paused, his hand on the doorknob, to glance at the home screen. Jim and Claire could wait until he had spoken to Nana and Arrrgh, right? But then again, unlike Nana, Jim and Claire hadn't heard from him before he was locked into that internship. He felt guilty, suddenly, for abandoning them like that, even if it hadn't been of his own volition. They were probably worried sick that he’d suddenly gone silent for weeks on end.

The thought sent a pang through his chest, and Toby reached out to pick up the phone. Suddenly, the screen flashed, and he nearly dropped it, staring in shock as the display suddenly strobed white with the notifications of three weeks that had suddenly crashed down all at once. He fully expected the barrage of texts and missed calls to calm down after a few seconds, but it didn’t _stop_.

Growing concerned, Toby unlocked his phone to cut off the flood of pings, checking the phone app first. _Two hundred and seventy-three missed calls_. That wasn’t normal. Jim and Claire would have gotten the hint after the first ten, Toby felt pretty sure. Nearly three hundred was - well, it was terrifying.

He called Jim immediately, trying to tamp down the growing quell of anxiety that rose as the phone continued to ring on the other end. When Jim’s voicemail message cheerfully sounded in his ear, Toby began to feel uncomfortably hot. He scratched the back of his neck anxiously as he selected Jim’s contact again, breathing speeding up as he was sent to voicemail again. Surely Jim would have called him back right away if he’d had reason to call him so many times in the first place. Was something wrong?

Toby switched to Claire’s contact, tapping frantically at her number as panic began to prickle under his skin, itchy and uncomfortable. Unlike Jim, Claire answered on the first ring.

“ _Toby!_ Where have you _been_?” Claire’s voice suddenly erupted from the phone, making Toby flinch violently at the sudden noise.

“Claire! Claire, I - what’s going on? I just got back and there’s almost three hundred calls on my phone, what the -”

“Jim’s gone,” she said, and Toby’s heart stuttered.

“Gone? What do you mean, like - like hunting, or -”

“He was captured, Toby. There was a trap.”

“What - what do you mean? What trap? He can’t - he’s Jim,” Toby laughed, the humor completely drained from his voice. Jim, who had accepted Merlin’s awful potion. Jim, who had gone into that bathroom a human boy, and had returned to them as - as something else. He towered over every human Toby knew, body newly layered with stone and muscle and spiked with tusks and horns, and despite his soft voice and careful movements, Jim’s restrained strength was almost terrifying. If he hadn't known Jim since they were both children, Toby _would_ be terrified. Toby had seen Jim fling an eight-ton troll warlord down an entire _street_ with his bare hands. No way in hell was anyone “capturing” him.

“Claire,” Toby began slowly, “what do you mean?”

Her voice was flat, resigned.

“We were cornered. The refugees from Trollmarket. There were these men, they had guns and - and these flashlights, ultraviolet, like the kind we used to try to kill Angor Rot. They knew what they were doing, Toby. They killed a stalkling to lure Jim out. They were prepared.”

A pit dropped in Toby’s stomach, the hope he had so carefully shielded withering as fast as it had sprouted. “Who were they, Claire? Who could possibly do that?”

“I don’t know,” she said despairingly. “They were dressed in black, and they looked human, but - they knew about trolls, Toby!”

Something was nagging at the back of Toby’s mind, and he frowned as he dug out his backpack, rummaging through his closet for fresh clothes. “How long ago did they take Jim?”

“About three weeks ago?” Claire said uncertainly. “Why? What do you know?”

Toby sucked in a shuddering gasp, shoving supplies into his backpack with more force than was strictly necessary. “Three weeks ago, I - they -” He cut himself off as the phone fell from his shoulder and clattered to the floor, swearing under his breath as he put the call on speaker and set the phone on his bed. “I went to this weird place for an internship,” he called over his shoulder as he pulled open the top drawer of his dresser. “They wanted me to study these rock samples.”

“You haven’t called back because you were at an _internship_?” Claire’s voice yelled from the tinny phone speaker. Toby winced with guilt.

“It’s not my fault!” he protested, returning to the bed to cram granola bars and bags of trail mix into his bag. “They took my phone, and my watch -”

“Okay, Toby,” Claire’s voice was uneven. “Okay. You were at an internship. What does that have to do with Jim getting captured?”

“Well, I - it could just be a coincidence,” Toby amended hastily. “But this lab was creepy as _hell_. And there were security people everywhere dressed in black!” An image of Not-Jared flashed into his mind, always wearing the same black padded armor, with the same long baton strapped to his back. Escorting Toby to and from his lab room, day after day. Making sure he didn’t step out of line while he worked - while he studied -

“Toby,” Claire began wearily, but Toby cut her off, a moment of clarity dawning on him.

“Claire,” he said seriously, staring at his phone, “They gave me samples of blue granite, diabase, and gneiss to analyze. They claimed it was for a local survey.”

“What does it matter, Toby?” Claire sounded near tears with frustration.

Toby took a deep breath, mentally organizing his explanation. “Before you guys left, I talked to Jim,” he started. “He turned into _stone_ , Claire. He let - he let me look at his hands, and his horns, to compare him to the other trolls, you know? My point is,” Toby rubbed his eyes, suddenly exhausted. “His skin is composed of blue granite. His nails are diabase. And his horns are made of gneiss. Now, what are the odds of those three types of stones - one that’s metamorphic, and two igneous minerals that didn’t come from the same volcano - showing up in the same backwoods of California at the same time, in a creepy lab that took my phone, where there were security guards dressed in black?”

There was a moment of silence, Toby staring at the phone. The faint sounds of Nana chatting happily to Arrrgh filtered up from the backyard, punctuating the quiet.

After a long pause, Claire’s voice crackled to life.

“You think this lab took Jim?”

“It’s possible,” Toby answered, the weight of uncertainty settling over his shoulders. “I went there around the same time Jim disappeared. But I never saw anything weird, only the guards, and the mineral samples.”

Claire was silent again.

“I’m coming back,” she said resolutely. “Blinky and the rest of Trollmarket are sheltering in an abandoned mine. I have to get Jim.”

“Fine, but I’m coming with you this time,” Toby countered. “I still have my warhammer, and a bag packed and ready to go.”

“Okay,” Claire said tiredly, “but we can’t storm anywhere with only two of us. We need help. We need to be sure we know where Jim really is.”

A thought clicked into Toby’s head - Aja and Krel. Aja may have returned to Akiridion-5, but Krel was still around, right? He had all that fancy alien technology, so maybe he would be willing to help. Toby was pretty sure he liked Jim enough to value his life.

“Jim told you about the Tarrons, right? Krel is still in Arcadia Oaks. He might be able track Jim down or something.”

“Worth a shot,” Claire agreed. “I’m going to hike back, I should be there by tomorrow morning. Meet me at his house?”

“Yeah, okay,” Toby acquiesced, reluctantly settling his backpack on the floor next to his bed. He sank onto the bedcovers next to his phone, Claire’s contact picture darkening. He had the feeling it was going to be a long night.

“Oh, and Toby?”

“What?”

“...do you think he’s still alive?”

“None of the samples I had were big enough to cause any damage if they were from him,” Toby answered automatically, but then paused. In a softer tone, he added, “Claire, he’s... he’s Jim. He’ll be okay. He survived the Darklands.”

“The Darklands were only two weeks,” Claire replied immediately, as if she’d already considered that and cast it aside.

Toby swallowed. “He’ll be okay, Claire.” He sounded unconvincing, even to himself. He looked out the window, at the burning sun that was gently painting the tops of the trees and dripping down the trunk. The conclusion of the third week - was it the third week of captivity for Jim? The third week of _what_ , exactly? Toby’s heart sank at the thought.

“He has to be.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your theories in the comments!!
> 
> Next chapter is in progress, but I have finals so it might be a couple weeks :) Things are still a little nuts right now, but the semester will be over soon so I'll have more time to work on things. Thanks for sticking with me, I really appreciate all the sweet comments and messages!!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading :)


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